Messy Little Raindrops
by TangledUpLies
Summary: They will shine through it all.


Hey! I'm going ramble/vent, so read or skip, if you choose.

Paget and AJ are returning! A total oh-em-gee-I'm-doing-a-happy-dance moment that was rudely interrupted when people started talking about Paget's contract and when people began calling Paget names. The former was confusing as hell with people explaining to me all the strings that were attached to her contract. But then to finally learn from Paget's Twitter that CBS _forced_ her to come back is absolutely atrocious. Gtfo, CBS. And I love this woman for her honesty. She's so real and straightforward, there are so many hearts in my eyes for her. This is such a messed up network and the producers are quite stupid as well, I can't even. They do not deserve the actors and this show. To first force Paget to leave and then to force her to come back, ugh, she's not a toy to push around. She's so talented and amazing; she deserves the utmost respect and love, but these people don't seem to know that. And if this contract that is forcing Paget to come back is just for season 7 and she chooses to not come back for season 8, so be it. Will I be sad and angry again? Probably since my emotions have been up and down with this entire situation. But it will all pass because whatever she is in and chooses to do, I'll support her and as long as she's happy, I'll be too. The latter was _so _I-don't-even-know-if-there-is-a-proper-word-I-can-type-here-without-offending-anyone. Seriously some people are so ridiculous for calling Paget ~stupid and ~disgusting when it was initially released that she was coming back. Ngl, but I was surprised that she was returning. At the same time though, I was thrilled because I've missed Emily Prentiss on my television screen. But what angered me so much was that they never for one second called AJ any names or bitched at her for returning because last time I checked because _both_ AJ and Paget were treated like shit by the network and producers, so what's up with that foolishness? Some people need to stop being so transparent. Also blaming Paget because Rachel was fired was also unbelievable. Blame the network and the producers. The blood is on their hands. They were the ones who made the decisions, not the actresses because this situation is a total mirror image of what happened last June. It's obvious that all the actresses are just pawns to them. And to top off this pile of bull, all those people that were so quick on hating Paget suddenly love her and support her after finding out that she was being forced to come back. How two faced can some people be? Pfft. This behind the scenes drama is such a bunch of fuckery. If the network and Ed and the producers had some brain cells to begin with and weren't so greedy, this complete mess and the idiotic words could have been avoided.

Secondly I want to just say is that it has been a year since I first posted my story! June sixth is the day, which means it's today! It is still for me at least anyway as I post this, lol. That makes me fly over the moon. It might not seem so Omg!worthy to whoever is reading this, but for me it's an accomplishment. I honestly didn't imagine myself to still be writing stories. But I am and I hope I can for a bit longer. I know I don't update as fast as some authors or as often as those who have triple the amount of stories even if they haven't been here longer than me, but to be here merely to share my work every chance I can get is a simple joy and pleasure. And that is due to the UHMAYZING people who are my readers. - angieee, Alece, alisunshine, Allie, allthatisevil, Ana, -Brennan, Angel N Darkness, anon, AureliaMarie, babygurl0506, baobei, Blakpyr8, Bloody Red Righetti, boobear13, Bri The Amazing, Calleygirl80, camiscintra, carez123, Catchermustang, CB, Celina79, charleanthersas, chibi kakashi, cm546, cmanonimo, CMC3, CMFAN2009, CMfanatic, crystal, CSIlover2much, cwhotchprentissfan, ..Side, Didi171, doctaj10, dragon81, Ecda, emilydoyle, EmmaBerlin, fanatic218, fanficlover, fireflamesinferno, firsttimereviewer, FlairingPhoenix, fningrandomty, ForensicMidnightReader, freaak tonight, hardly loquacious, hdg, HGRHfan35, History05, Holly Rosslyn, HPforever-after, Illyria09, Imme23, Jessica, jiiMINDS, junealii, justalongreviewhere, KaiGalla, kateadams, Kdala, kidkarmina, Kimmeke, kimtom4eva, kitcat19us, kobitah, kurussom, LacytheDemonicWerewolf, LarissaBabehh, LeanneDaseyLover, leorockqueen723, lilylynn, lilz54, linelm, Luv-A-Bull, Magickalaja2, Marze2403, MeGkAtHeRiNe, miaa29, Michaela123, miranda953, Mr. Typo, MrsHotcher22, Muralice, lvgsrcsi, Nena Cero, nerdlovescm, Obssessed-fan-cecy, Odainath, olive-grove, Owl Emporium, peannoir, penguinlover250, Petit Sidle, phoebe9509, PrincessAletheia, PrincessHotch, purpleplasticpurse, RachelPrentiss22, rbeeliner06, Rolfy, romiross, sammydavisjr, sarramaks, SassyKAB, silenceiseverything, silvereyes12, sissysage3000, solveariddle, sophonsified, spookie nights, springfiry, SSAEmilyHotchner, SSA Cuteass, starryeyes12, Steffi1986, StroodleDoodledFuhn, Sweetylove30, TaylorOwnzYourPants, tazlvr2001, tbird1965, Tiecollector, trailweary, UCLA7, Veda Leen, WellITriedSoManyOptions., yaba, zimrah. I'm pretty sure I got everyone and spelled everyone's name correctly, lol. If not, let me know, and I'll fix it or add you in. But really, you guys with your sweet words and favorites make it worth posting here and y'all deserve hugs and cookies! Thank you so much for sticking with me and giving me more support than I could ever have expected. Stay awesome!

And _finally_ because my notes are turning out longer that some stories here, a big thank you to the ones who reviewed and favorited _Inside Out_! They were just so darn awesome it made me forget about real life. My realization that me in the real world will not mix, I've been so emotionally and mentally drained I didn't start this for a while after I posted last time. This has been in my head since _Lauren _and took a bit over a month to write out. If anyone remembers my previous note, I mentioned some ideas/scenes I wanted to write because the writers sucked so hardcore. Well this is one and my fingers are crossed I did the scene justice because even if I feel like I hell, I put tons of effort into it! Also this is, but not really, a continuation of _Inside Out._ I believe you can read this solo. There are just a few mentions of that story in here. Whatever floats your boat in all honesty, lol. And I normally… or haven't done this at all because I don't know if anyone actually seriously cares and I feel like I'm giving away my secret, lol I'm so odd, a _huge_ chunk of this story and my brainstorming/writing process has been courtesy of listening to Birdy's version of "Skinny Love" on repeat. As you are reading this, the song is playing and has been played near 700 times in a span of thirty days. Hah. If you're super duper cool and have excellent taste in television, (though yes, I'm aware this song came out before) some of you probably heard this song on _The Vampire Diaries_ like I first did. Anyone who hasn't watched the show should definitely start if you have the time during the hiatus. It's _so _good; it makes me cry happy tears, lol. But for now, read this while listening to the song. I personally and absolutely _love_ the combination. Maybe some of you will too or just hate it. Nevertheless, it's a great and gorgeous song that should be on everyone's iPod. Grammar issues and bad stuff as usual are my responsibility. There's also the whole going back to the past thing I seem to really love to do. That may seem a bit _too_ long or drags the story, but I couldn't force myself to cut them down even after I tried to. They were fun for me to write. I just hope it doesn't take away from what the overall scene/story is actually about. I tried incorporating the few hints and all the little things that led to her running away and all the information Emily told Doyle. I might have missed something or interpreted it differently, I'm not sure. I also did my best at including all there needed to be regarding I guess… the understanding/thoughts that would be going through both their minds during this time. I hope the characterization is alright because keeping them in character is _always_ one of my goals. I tried not making them too ~weak or extremely ~sappy, but given the situation they are in, I thought that it might/could be at least a bit appropriate. But I'll see with what y'all have to tell me about that and everything else. I know this might have come out rather long; I _sincerely_ hope that some of you have the attention span to finish this, lol. Reading this could be easier and less overwhelming if I broke it down into chapters, _but _to me, everything seems more fitting together then to separate one scene into different parts. I am quite curious though if some of you read my stories in one sitting or read them a little at a time because they do feel a bit time consuming even when I read over them and because my hit counts rollercoaster oddly. And I'm wondering if that plays as a factor if people review or not or if they in general have a problem with my writing/stories. Anyway, enjoy and have a great time with the story! If you have a moment whenever you finish this, cherries on top please leave a review and let me know what you think. It'll be just the best thing ever in the world for me to hear your opinions and to get some feedback. Thanks a bunch! =D

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><p>"<em>She can't stay<em>..._"_

Two hours, forty nine minutes and thirteen seconds since those three words have been murmured.

Drip drop. Drip drop. Drip drop.

Standing behind the double doors, staring straight through the small windows, the inescapable smell of the hospital covering him, assaulting every part of his senses as his chest tightened into thousands of knots, Aaron Hotchner had pushed, forced those broken words from out between his thin and dry lips. The only answer, the inevitable answer that came screaming at him, punching him in his heart had been that.

"_She can't stay…"_

Drip drop. Drip drop. Drip drop.

He hadn't noticed when it first started, this weather she loves. It took him a while to hear their sounds, see their presence.

They're soaking the concrete grounds and brick buildings, creating large and dirty puddles, gliding down the clean glass windows as the tires of the black vehicle he drives at thirty miles rolls down the same wet streets it had done so just fifty four minutes ago in the very early Monday morning.

These messy little raindrops she never can get enough of. These messy little raindrops he had discovered on a warm September early morning that was one of her favorite things in the world. These messy little raindrops that had him crawling out of bed after her because he had just wanted to sit up with her by his window overlooking the city of New York.

"Everything smells new, doesn't it?" Closer she had snuggled to him while the corners of his mouth had twitched up. "When it rains… everything smells new… feels clean… and is _so _beautiful…"

Now as he watches them falling hard and fast, everything isn't like what she had told him that night in New York. It doesn't smell new because all that is currently filtering up his nostrils is the lingering smell of the hospital he recognizes too clearly. It doesn't feel clean because he's not. He remains feeling the failure of the day clinging onto the fabrics of his clothes and bleeding into the pores of his skin. Everything isn't beautiful because the one person he wants to see, the one person he _needs_ to hold onto, is no where in sight. He's alone. And because regardless the picture of the raindrops coming down, the noise of the drip drops going against his eardrum, Hotch continues to hear three words he wished he never would have to string together.

"_She can't stay…"_

That is what rings the loudest.

Through the water droplets clashing against surfaces, through the faint city sounds and even through the thousand and one hits his heart is taking before they fall off and crash down into the million and one pieces to the ground, those words to Jennifer Jareau who had stood beside him surpasses everything else.

"_She can't stay…"_

It had taken a hundred and forty seconds after the woman with the red swollen eyes and terse pink lips had whispered to him the information he had desperately needed to hear.

"They… the nurse… they said she's… they're doing well in there… with her…"

Arms down by his sides with his hands clenched, Hotch had not said anything.

"She's going to be okay..."

Instead he had remained motionless with his flat eyes staring directly through the eight by eight windows on the door because in his head, with the silent minutes feeling like silent years, he had been thinking, wondering already the what ifs. And in the end, the only solution he could see from adding everything together and putting the broken pieces of this puzzle of the last two days together had been, is that.

"She can't stay…"

What he had gotten had been a long and hard gaze from her.

"She _can't_ stay…"

But turning his head to meet it, he had not done. He couldn't. For eleven minutes following then, he hadn't, couldn't move a single muscle until her small quivering voice next him had spoke again, shattering his already fractured world.

"I know…"

His hands clench tight onto the steering wheel. He's just three blocks away now. Three blocks from closing the distance that has been between them for three weeks. The streetlight turns a blinding red.

"_She never made it off the table."_

Hotch has trouble remembering now. Even if only has been an hour and thirty nine minutes since the statement had been said, he can't remember how it had been even thought up. He can't remember how those words were chosen. He can't remember if he who was the one that had chosen them or her. All he remembers now as the light turns the bright green and he makes a right turn is that he never shed a tear. He had held everything in. The seams on his heart had been tied tight. He had kept that everyday stoic mask on his face. Taking shallow steady breaths, avoiding the torn faces of the people around him, walking away from the cries, from the disbelief, he had done what she did so well.

Compartmentalize.

And when he had been standing alone behind those double doors once more, double doors that had been another barrier to lead him down to wherever she was lying in _alive_, staring down at the white and moss green linoleum tiles and feeling his mind spin as his heart had been squeezed with no mercy with the invisible seams near breaking, every moment they had in this city and that state, every emotion they had expressed in his home and her home, every tender and feverish kiss they had pressed to the nook and crannies of each other's body, and every word they had spoken only for one another's ears had came pushing forward.

But still, nothing had come out.

He didn't, wouldn't allow the salty drops of water to fall from his eyes, let alone form.

Hotch had shoved everything into those little black boxes she does too often.

"She's going to be okay."

That statement then had been whispered again. Her eyes red and puffy, the sniffles loud in the quiet part of the halls JJ had found him. The reassurance had been between him and her. However it was for a whole new circumstance.

"I know."

And his response, something he had been trying to tell himself at the news that she was doing good, well with her body cut open to stop the internal bleeding, something he continues to convince himself of now because he will need to for her and for himself too eventually, had been the same one from her trembling lips hours ago. Yet despite the similar words put together, it had been different once more for the lie they were building.

The windshields are moving fast back and forth as he makes one left turn and another before slowly entering into the quiet and dead lot. Hotch finds a space easily near the entrance of the hateful building right underneath the yellow orange light before shutting the vehicle off and pulling the key out from the ignition. For a good sixty seconds, he sits frozen with his sights downcast at the steering wheel.

He wants to rewind time.

Rewind back to two days ago. Two days ago where he would have caught her from the corner of his eye before she had left to do what she thought would have been the best for him, for all of them. Rewind back to a week and a half ago. A week and a half ago when he would have held onto her, making her talk, making her tell him instead of allowing her to step out the door. Rewind back to three weeks ago. Three weeks ago when he had first noticed something had been off.

Yet he can't.

He shouldn't be here at the moment listening to the shaky inhales he draw compete with the sounds of the raindrops. She shouldn't be somewhere in there thinking she's alone and feeling scared because he knows her, and he doesn't doubt she is. They should be in another city, another state. But most of all, Hotch wishes they were home hundred of miles away, where they would be sound asleep, safe and warm wrapped under their thick blankets for the new day approaching them.

Drip drop. Drip drop. Drip drop.

If he can wish for that, he would nothing more than just that now.

Opening the door, he steps out. He thrusts the key into his pants pocket. Gusts of March winds hit him from the side. Yet he feels nothing. Not the chill, not the tiny bumps that are suppose to rise on his skin because he's tired and cold without his coat and with the rain. The suit he has been wearing since seven yesterday morning is immediately absorbing the water falling down on him while his short black hair with the tiniest specks of grey if someone studies too closely does the same.

But Hotch doesn't run. He doesn't speed up his movements at all because his legs can't. They are simply moving like an ordinary walk from here to there towards the automatic doors.

The smell of the hospital, the smell of death and despair hits his nostrils and wraps around every part of him instantly like before when he stands in the florescent lit entry way. He wonders how long it will linger on him this time. After Foyet, it had taken him a month before he had managed scrub away the distinctive and unwelcoming smell of the week long stay he had on the fourth floor at St. Sebastian. He glances around. A few doctors, a handful of nurses and just a dozen or so of people waiting, sitting in the uncomfortable chairs he had sat in hours ago scattering around. But all he does is narrow his sight at the front desk.

A woman, perhaps around his age with dirty blonde hair sits murmuring into the phone with her gaze set onto the open file in front of her. He waits hardly a minute before that call ends and she looks up, meeting his eyes with her grey blue eyes accompanied in the company of her tired expression.

"May I help you, sir?"

He swallows hard, moistening his dry throat. "Um… I'm looking for um… a Jane Doe…" Hotch utters softly.

It hurts to say that. As if he doesn't know who she is, as if she has no identity when it's the complete opposite because he knows her, knows her inside out more than she has ever liked to admit because it's the exact same thing the other way around. But he has no other option than to call her that because he doesn't have any sliver of an idea what was told to the nurses once he had returned to the waiting lounge.

And he didn't ask her.

He couldn't.

After driving back with everyone, sauntering to their rooms on the ninth floor of the hotel like broken soldiers with their shoulders slumped and the still quiet cries, he had waited while fumbling with his key card until they had all, including the woman who is keeping this secret with him, to go into their rooms. He had turned back around to make his trip back to the elevators and down to the garage to get here.

This place she is in and he has no idea who and where she is.

"Injury… a, um, a stab wound to her stomach..." The words rolling out are shaking while he makes a quick motion his own part of the body.

"And you-"

Hotch makes no short of a moment, reaching to the inside of his suit jacket and pulling out his credentials and flipping it open. Her eyes shift to it, bending forward a little to make certain it is really what it is before bobbing her head just slightly and turning to the computer screen by her side.

"She was brought in a few hours ago… she lost a lot of blood…"

His voice is a touch steadier as he pushes back his credentials inside his pocket and watches her thin fingertips tap to the black keyboard.

It takes a moment longer until the woman looks back up at him. "Ah, we have, um, a Sarah James… and she came out of surgery almost two hours ago… and is now in room 5042. She had-"

"If anyone asks for now, do not release the information. Thank you," he cuts her off hastily with a terse nod and twists away from her.

There is no desire or need to listen to the details.

He makes the twenty four second journey to the elevator at the end of the floor and hurriedly presses the ascending button twice. The upwards arrow lights up immediately while the metal doors opens. And once he is inside alone, he nearly jabs at the round circle with the number five before the elevator begins to move. He runs a hand through his wet hair, shaking it slightly to rid of the excess water droplets before moving the limb to fiddle with the knot of the tie that has yet to be loosened since yesterday morning. The minute ride up feels almost like an eternity until the doors open. Hotch takes in a quarter of dozen mouthful of the nauseating air into his lung before he steps out. Gaping up at the signs above, he catches a fleeing peek at the clock hanging on the wall. The thin and long line glides to the eight.

Precisely twenty minutes until four in the morning.

He has hardly slept in three days. He thinks the total has been just under two hours because he simply hadn't been able to. The worst scenarios had flooded his mind the moment his eyes had dropped shut. So cup after cup of strong black coffee has been his friend, keeping him awake, allowing him the extra hours of looking over the files, the evidence they have found.

Hotch turns his feet to the left and takes his first step.

One.

Another and another he continues to proceed. He turns the corner. The fear and nervousness begins pumping through his veins.

Sixteen.

His eyes read the increasing white digits printed on the watermelon color blocks beside the door. He walks in a straight path.

Thirty nine.

He makes sure to not bump into anyone, anything parked in the aisles. An additional turn he makes. Each open door he passes he hears the sharp beeps.

Fifty seven.

And once he mentally counts to step number sixty eight in the back of head, seeing that the destination he is journeying to is just three doors down and perhaps a dozen steps away, his movements halt when the door opens. Out saunters out a nurse, clipboard hugged closed to her chest. She tugs the door behind her. The gentle click echoes loudly in the soundless halls. She passes him, a polite smile graced on her face. Yet he does not return one, only bobbing his head in the smallest of movements before turning his attention to the room she has just left.

Hotch feels his cracked heart throbbing underneath the suit and beneath his skin and bones.

Seventy four.

His pulse has quickened immensely.

Eighty.

The final step, even and clean, he comes to.

Gradually he reaches up and grips on the door handle. His heartbeat increases, wondering the state he will find her in. Quietly sleeping or wide awake, a large swelling in his throat emerges. He gapes down at his polished leather shoes, the sight seemingly growing hazy before gently pushing down the metal lever until the familiar sound from moments ago flow into his ears. Pushing inch by inch back, he hears his breathing turning even heavier, even sharper.

_She's going to be okay._

He hears the simple line running through his head.

Once Hotch raises his head, his hazy eyes narrowing directly at one place only with the seven feet distance that feels like seven miles, the state he finds _her_, Emily Prentiss and not Sarah James, is in the latter.

His first look at her in days because he hadn't been there in time. In the warehouse with the stake into her stomach he hadn't seen. But what he saw; discovered had been the puddle of blood on the cement ground. The medics had arrived, took her away as her pulse continued to decrease and her heart had stopped momentarily he was informed. He had stood still, frozen for a minute too long staring at dark red color hoping, praying that it wasn't going to end like that.

For her, for him, for them; there had been too many words left unsaid.

That couldn't be their end.

And it hadn't been because she's right there, right _here_.

Her head twisted just slightly to face him. Her dark eyes widen. She lies completely on her back, impossible for her body to barely be positioned at an angle with the dozens of stitches sealing up her wound she feels weighing her down to the bed. The sharp beeps of the monitors filter through. The tubes connected to her arms he can't ignore. Those thick bangs brushed to the side as the few lone strands falls from behind her ear. And underneath the lowly lit white light hanging above her bed, the ivory skin he loves to trail his mouth along is sickly pale, almost translucent with the patches of pale blues and purples.

With the best attempt he can muster, Hotch offers her a sad, but more than that, a grateful coil of his thin lips because she is in front of his eyes.

_She's going to be okay._

"Hey."

The gesture he gives; the greeting he says she doesn't return. She doesn't know if she can.

All she knows is the quickening heave of her bruised chest while the fresh stitches keeping her together are more than ready to break at the sight of him now.

He shouldn't be here.

A part of her doesn't expect him to be here. A part of her doesn't even expect herself to be here. Sealed in a body bag inside a morgue she should be in because holding out, doing everything she could, wasting as much time for him, for the people she had been wanted more than anything to protect to come to her, to save her had been minutes too late for her.

Emily gapes at him taking three small footsteps in and closes the door gently behind him with their gazes never wavering. That swelling four leaf clover brand she can feel through the thin hospital gown above her left breast is nailing her to the bed. Her parched lips shake within seconds as she fists the thin mint green blanket covering her. He takes the five steps to his left, lifting the cushioned wooden chair easily up. The sounds of his shoes against the tile floors mix with unmistaken labored breaths and the raindrops that hit against her window, the tears that she had done so well to hold in when she had been marked, done so well to push away when she had opened her eyes to realized she was still alive, that she had actually made it through rise up once more.

Like a pro, like those other times, she doesn't, will not, cannot let them stream down her cheeks.

In just six more steps, he sets the seat by her bedside.

She feels the air around her, around them go thick.

But before he sits, he's reaching for her hand, cold almost like ice because the room is cool in the March morning yet moist from nervousness in her because of his presence. The blanket is released. Lacing their fingers together for the ten thousandth times since that night in Atlantic City, Hotch leans over her and sets his quivering mouth onto her warm forehead. And with the touch as plain and as loving as it can be, as only he can has ever delivered to her for hundreds of times, the unexpected sobs cut through her.

"I'm _so_ sorry…"

Her apology for the glassiness she can't avoid from his broken eyes moments ago. Her apology for not telling him because even if she had desperately wanted to; she couldn't. Her apology to erase the guilt she is well aware of cramming into his head and heart because she knows exactly how he can feels even when he doesn't tell and she doesn't doubt she is correct right now. And her apology for what she has made him endure through the last week and a half because that night when he had asked and she had lied, and when he had pressed and she had pulled away; has been drowning her in remorse and a sea of fear that somehow, somewhere deep down, he regrets her too much and hates her too little.

"I'm _so _sorry…"

On an early Friday morning in the city of Charleston when the pitter patter of water droplets had hit against his windows and the red digits of the small clock residing on the nightstand in the ninth floor hotel room at the end of the hall had turned thirteen minutes after two in the morning, it had been nearly half an hour since they had began to lay together. Naked, legs over and under one another beneath the thick comforters, her forehead had been against his strong jawline. Emily had her hand on his chest, tapping every few seconds to match the beats of the raindrops and heartbeats as one of his arms had snaked around her waist to settle a tender stroke against her thigh. But another night of the silence, the comfort, the stillness that they had been enjoying, relishing since that last Thursday of March of the almost past year, had been cracked when Hotch had spoke softly.

"You know… you can talk to me… tell me… anything…"

His words she had known all along because what he had said had been the same for him from her. He could to her, about anything, about everything that he bottled up when he stopped wearing the pressed suits and silk ties. But that moment, as the tears had begun to well up in her eyes and she had hoped nothing would drop onto his bare skin, she had been taken aback by them because in the back of her mind, she knew she couldn't. Not with what she was keeping from him, from everyone one of them who had been throwing her concern looks.

Nevertheless, Emily had given him an answer he had expected.

"I know..."

She had felt him nod at her trailed off words, drawing in a steady breath while the fingertips she had on his chest had begun scratching at his flesh lightly and calmly. Her heartbeat had increased though. Her head had spun as well. And once she had pulled back three inches and craned her slender neck up while the eyes he had on the yellow ceiling had turned downcast to meet hers, she had whispered it for him again.

"I know…"

But it had been that second time, the second reassurance she gave him that was the mistake she made.

"Then talk to me…" The movements alongside his chest had frozen momentarily. "Tell me what's wrong."

Something had been wrong.

A small fraction of him had told him it was perhaps his imagination, his paranoid mind because he was always worried about her. But he realized it would have been a lie for the straightforward reason that he felt it with her, saw it in her.

Because for the last twenty one days, from out the corners of his eyes; Hotch had been watching her closely. The dazed expressions she had painted on her face more often than usual when she sat at her desk completing the case files, the quietness she would take up while biting her already short nails and staring out the window of the jet or hotels room, and the simplicity of eluding his questions and everyone else's gaze when she had showed up to the briefings late three times in seventeen days. And when they were alone together in her room or his room, she would be in her own world, needing him to say her name a several extra times before realizing he had been talking to her.

Even if he had delayed before asking her, wondering if and hoping she would eventually tell him because that had been how they worked, waiting for one another to talk, trusting each other to step forward, Hotch knew it. Yet it had been perhaps the hour before they began lying together in the silence that had been the final nudge to question it aloud.

Distance, he had felt between them.

Despite the fact that he had been nestled so warmly into her, pushing into her hard because she had begged quietly into his left ear as the bed creaked softly beneath them and her short nails had dug into his strong shoulder blades; something about her had felt _so_ far away from him.

For a while now she had felt so far away from him.

He had no other option.

Emily had sense her mouth go ajar with the soft yet intense he had started to use on her. Inhaling sharply, she had twisted her gaze downcast as a part of her panicked.

"Um… I'm…"

_I'm in trouble._

"I'm… fine…"

_I'm scared._

"Just tired…"

_I don't know what to do._

"A little stressed…"

_But I can't tell you._

"That's all…"

_I'm sorry._

Then she had raised her eyes back up, offering him a faint smile only to be met by the hurt flickering in his eyes.

"You're not very good at it."

Her forehead had furrowed a touch. "What?" Her heart had thumped louder into the rainy night while the hand on his chest he covered with his own.

"Lying… to me… you're not very good at it…"

The simplest reason was that he could read her easily. It hadn't been tiredness. It hadn't been the stress. And it hadn't been all there were to her answer. Like a book open directly before his eyes, the expression in front of him, the fear lingering in her stare, the way that curve of her lips was pasted on her pale face, he had not doubt it was a lie.

She hadn't realized the few additional inches from him she had shifted back bit by bit. "I'm not ly-"

"_No_."

That one word had came out hard.

The trigger had been pulled.

"Just _drop_ it."

Without delay, the subdued plead with the hint of annoyance, of denial, but especially of fear dripping in the three words because she never had him pressing her and always had him waiting for her to tell him eventually, had thrown her under a bus.

His hand had curled around hers as his voice turned adamant, determined.

"_No_…" Keeping his voice leveled and low his gripped turned more firm. "You've been distant. Acting differently, coming in-"

Yet before Hotch could had continued; all Emily had done was jerk her hand away from under his, anger and shock flashing in her dark glassy eyes in the dimness of his room.

"_Don't_ profile me," she had whispered to him heatedly through clenched teeth and sat up. The comforter came falling down, her breasts exposed and rising and falling rapidly.

He had followed suit without hesitation. "Then _talk to me_. Something is going on. And the fact that you're looking at me, _lying_ to me, telling me you're fine when-"

"I'm not doing _this_ right now!" she had hissed.

"Then when is the right time because for the last three weeks I've been waiting for you to say something to me, to tell me _something_," he had spit back at her in frustration.

More than that though, that frustration; she had heard the desperation in his tone.

Concern, scared and helpless he had just been for her and deep down, for them too.

But she hadn't want to, _couldn't_ do it.

Fight him.

Those walls she built up around her since six weeks prior at the news of the haunting face she had buried years ago returning had begun to cave in little by little every passing day. And at the moment with his question, they had started closing in even faster. Emily couldn't let him break it. In her head, in her heart, she had known it would be for him, for his protection, for the best.

She had thrown him a glare before tugging the covers back. She couldn't stay. Bare feet against the rough forest green carpet, Emily had begun gathering her clothes. Slipping the burgundy lace he had ripped off her back up her long legs and threading her arms through the hoops of the matching bra, his eyes had burned through her as he himself had gotten out of bed, putting on his navy boxer briefs. Then Hotch had walked to her, made a reach for her elbow as she had been buttoning her slacks only for her to move back fiercely without delay but with regret.

"It's not like you tell me _everything_!" The anger in her eyes had seeped and increased into her statement. "You keep things to yourself! So _don't_ fucking start with me!"

"What do you want to know then?" His voice had raised the slightest, drawing his hand back. "_Ask me_. Ask me and I will tell you everything you want to know so I can fucking start somewhere with you!"

Emily hadn't.

"Go to hell!"

Her voice had been harsh, cutting into him. She had looked at him no more. Hurriedly and messily her white pinstriped button down had been pulled over her rising chest. Beyond the anger in her eyes, beyond the venom in her tone, beyond the fire lighting up in her stomach, she had felt the waves of guilt course through the fibers in her body.

All he had wanted to do was to help her.

"Emily…"

Her name off his lips had been gentle. He hadn't wanted to argue with her. That would've gotten him and them no where. Nonetheless it had felt like a gunshot directly into her heart. Her name out his mouth in utter hopelessness. Hotch had walked two footsteps closer, only to have her retreat further away.

She simply couldn't tell him, put him in jeopardy.

"_Just… leave me alone, Aaron."_

Hoping he would get the message all the while the tears had built swiftly up in her eyes.

And if she had looked up then; from fetching her socks by the foot of the bed, from picking up her black boots she had not bothered to even put back onto her feet before trudging back to her room two doors down from his, wondering if the last eleven minutes after two in the morning was becoming the final chapter of them, Emily would have seen his too.

Yet she hadn't.

Out his door she had walked out without a glance behind her.

She had done her best to avoid him after that night.

Never being alone with him in the same room for more than a mere few seconds because more than once she had feared he would corner her even in public because he was going desperate. Never standing too close to him for his familiar and comforting scent to ascend up her nostrils and seep into the pores of her skin. Never talking to him unless they were working because sitting in the quiet hotel room with Sergio by her side late at night, she had watched his five phone calls to go directly to her voicemail. And never looking at him because that intense stare would convey more than the words that were being unspoken between them; the distance she had been putting between them grew.

Hotch hadn't been able deny it anymore.

Everything around them, everything between them had changed, turning black and crumbling apart. Something was more than obviously wrong. And the only thing he had been able to do was continue to wait for her, wait for her to find him standing alone.

But then _he_ got closer.

The target on her back becoming more visible, feeling more apparent, weighing her down with each step she took away from him, from everyone who had been worried about her, Emily had wanted nothing more than to knock on his door and tell him she was sorry, that she loved him, to explain all the secrets she had been keeping from him and for him to say that everything will be okay.

She didn't though, knowing what had happened that night in Charleston, the pressing, the questioning would more than likely resume because she knew him like the back of her hand. He wouldn't have dropped it. He would have been determined to break those walls that separated them once more, to figure out what was wrong with her and fix what problem it may be. It would have been just like him to do so. Yet Emily hadn't been able to bear the thought of walking away from him a second time.

So she never did.

And before Hotch could have blinked twice, inhale the air that had barely had a trace of the lingering scent of the vanilla and blossoms on her ivory skin, Emily had been gone.

Just like that.

Leaving without the goodbye, the explanation he deserved more than anything she could ever give him at that moment, she had backed out of the bullpen, trying to block out his voice and remember it all at once because for the last eleven months, it had been his voice, his words, _him_, that had made her think, made her feel more than she ever had in her life.

Selfish; the word was stamped on her brain and heart.

Because all Hotch had gotten as a result, all he had discovered left behind by her once the realization of what she had been hiding, what she had been so afraid of revealing to him, to everyone when he had called her to wonder where she was, to demand answers to the hundreds of question that flooded his mind within seconds, to convince her that everything would be okay if she came home because she had all of them by her side, and to whisper to her like so many times before that he loved her, had been the items she took pride in carrying and moments that were shared by just the two of them.

Her badge, her ID tag and her gun, three things she carried with her head held up high. Three things she had proved to him half a decade ago that she was worthy of having. Three things she had earned through the long nights and early mornings of hard work along with the loyalty she gave to him, to the team without hesitation.

That image of himself appearing on her phone had made his heart stop for a split second and his body freeze. The sight of his own smiling face staring back at him had immediately taken him back down to that second Saturday morning of December. How she had finally managed to obtain the picture; how even if it had been a simple shot of his own picture he currently had clipped to his jacket, seeing it appear before his eyes as the ringing continued for seven additional seconds, had meant more than he saw.

And the stress ball, the heart shape stress ball he had gotten from his doctor on his yearly checkups the first week of October. That heart shaped stress ball with the invisible words carved into it he had given to her in hopes she would stop the habit of picking her nails the third Sunday morning of the very month when she had gone home with him after the case in Hartford.

Emily had been standing in the middle of his room half dressed and hair still slightly disheveled from their one extra round once they had woke. The faint aroma of his favorite dark roast coffee mixed with the familiar smell that rain was coming danced up her nostrils while she had pushed small clear buttons through their holes at ten after ten on the cloudy morning. Just one cup he had requested quietly against her ear. Have one cup of coffee before she would leave and he would pick up Jack. She had agreed to it, playfully sulking and accepting his invitation before she had giggled and kissed him on the cheek and he had left her in the room.

His footsteps were quiet coming up behind her once the last button had made it through. She had twisted around, a smile bright on her face at the scene of him holding the handle of the white mug filled with the delicious liquid for her. Emily had accepted the drink happily, blowing on it before taking a slow sip immediately and sighing pleasantly while Hotch had eyed her naked legs for a moment before shifting his gaze to the ground.

Her eyes were curious as she had stared at him with those five inches between them. "You okay?" She had asked after a few minutes.

A tender coil of his thin lips once his attention returned to her, he had stated calmly, "Yeah… um… here." He had held out his right hand, a heart shaped object he had all along since his return from the kitchen coming to her attention for the first time sat in the center of his large palm.

"What is that?" Her tone had been amused and sugary while she had chuckled.

With his hand out still, Hotch had quipped with a crooked grin, "A stress ball. I got it from the doctors last week… and I think you might need it more than me." His hearty laugh had filtered the room when his head had motioned towards her hand, but her fingers and bitten nails in particular.

Her giggle had followed suit. Emily had raised her hand to cup the bottom of the mug as she took another sip of the coffee before remarking with her tone coy and tantalizing as a wide illuminating beam and her arched eyebrow graced his sight, "Hmm… for a moment there I thought you were offering me your heart, Mr. Hotchner?"

A simple joke it had been; nothing but teasing him because she loved doing it to him.

"You already have it."

The soft statement had risen up in him and flowed from his lips unexpectedly and into her ears surprisingly. Emily had felt her eyes enlarging, her pulse beginning to speed up, wondering, wanting to believe he had mistaken with his words or she had simply heard it all wrong.

"What?"

The gentle inaudible query had escaped from her mouth.

"I love you…"

Soon after, her throat had constricted, registering exactly what he had so softly said. The water in her gaze of him had crept steadily out. She had thought that her grip of the mug would fall from her grip and the dark liquid would seep and stain the sandy colored carpet underneath her bare feet.

A declaration Hotch hadn't planned for this moment. A declaration she hadn't even been sure would _ever _be between them for the simple reason she didn't know if he could again.

Love, love _her_ to be exact.

Through the struggles he faced in his marriage and ultimately losing the woman he had spent nearly two decades with and who he had made a family with to divorce and death, Emily had understood if he couldn't. She wouldn't have found fault with it, with him. Being with him, having him make her soar when he released into her, helping her sleep with his strong arms around her, enjoying the simple company of talking to one another late at night when and if she couldn't sleep and he stayed up with her, it would be, was good enough for her.

Just that she had decided after the two month mark had hit from that Thursday night.

How they were, the simplicity of having one another after the year long denial and battle of resistance, Emily had been alright with just the way they were. Then everything that she would have been good enough for with him had turned better than she could've ever imagined of, hoped for that she had thought of them once or twice. Those words he had just told her. That she wouldn't; couldn't lie about. And up until the moment as she had remained standing with just her shirt on and her hair messy whilst the gift of the red object and his words had been hanging between them, it would have been alright if he never would have said those words to her.

So she hadn't expected at all.

The slightest curve crept slowly across his face as she had stared straight at him.

Whether she was aware or not and he assumed it the latter, he hadn't planned on it. Those words put together in that specific order he had thought of he wouldn't deny because that something about her blending with all he knew and all he felt made him think of it. Yet the statement in this particular moment as well had caught him in shock like it had her in front of him. Despite it though, an impulsive action it was, the expression painted on her face with her cheeks turning almost a bright pink in the sweet silence between them and the sound of water outside, Hotch had realized he wouldn't change if he had been given the opportunity to rewind the clock two hundred seconds back.

There was something about her. Something he first thought about after Colorado, something he couldn't stop thinking about after Louisville and something he knew for certain after Atlantic City that had been about her. But Hotch never found a word, a sentence to describe it for that something unknown about her to him. All he knew and all he felt had been that the way she smiled, whether it was softly or broadly, the way she would kiss him while her tiny hands roam his body and caressed his scars, the way she would simply settle beside him just because she wanted to be close to him had the corners of his mouth tilting up, the sudden sparks from here and there all over his body going off and the pacifying state he would be in almost instantly even after a gruesome day.

Her covered chest rose and fell rapidly. He hadn't even needed to look directly down to see it. Whether she was scared or elated at what he had said, all he knew was that his own heart underneath the white cotton undershirt and his flesh and bones heart had beat just as fast or perhaps faster when he took the first step to her and reached out to gently pull the mug filled with the hot liquid out her hold to be placed on the dresser at arm's length. Then to her, his right arm wrapping around her tiny waist as that heart stress ball had been against her back. His left hand had cupped her face while she had bit the corners of her mouth and fisted the soft cotton undershirt over his chest from the day before with both hands.

Pressing his forehead to hers, the glassiness in her eyes growing while their stare never broke from one another, Hotch had told her again.

"I love you, Emily."

The sound of her name rolling off his tongue subsequently after the three little words had been the reality of it.

He did.

With his thumb caressing her cheek then, he had leaned down closer, hoping to catch her mouth in his. But the few degrees her head had tilted to prevent it as she had pulled the arm from around her away and tugged his hand up between them. She had turned her focus down to his enclosed hand. It had taken her a moment until she nudged his fingers just a touch to open to reveal the heart, _his_ heart. Her hand had tremble as it moved over it. And in seconds, eight to be exact because they had both counted in the back of their heads, Emily had covered that red cushioned heart shaped object with her fingers curling around it. She gazed back up at him with a shy curve of her pink lips as she had took three baby steps forward to press their bodies together.

"I love you, _too_."

On her toes she had stood to catch his mouth tenderly in hers.

Thirty seven minutes later, after the periwinkle hued dress shirt she had put on came back off while her hair got a little messier and the mug of coffee that had gone too cold from sitting on the top of his dresser waiting to be drunk because her high whimpers and his low growls were bouncing off his bedroom walls once again and slipped out through the tiniest crack of his window to mix and mingle with the water droplets falling from the sky, Emily had left with the heart shaped stress ball tucked into her bag and his words from his heart tucked into her own.

He loved her. She loved him.

And then nearly four and a half months later, things that were her security and identity, words that were whispered alone, moments that were stitched into her heart and _him_, the one particular someone that had impacted her life more than ever, the one particular someone she could never want to part with or ever would no matter what was to happen to her had all been all left behind.

That had been what Emily left behind for him to find, left behind as the only farewell she could give him to remember because she hadn't had the courage to do so to his face.

Along with being selfish, she had been the biggest coward.

"I'm _so _sorry… _I'm so sorry_, Aaron…"

Every emotion, everything she has been reigning in for the last six weeks in her head, in her heart runs free and loose from her like wild horses.

Hotch brings a hand up to the side of her head. The grip onto one another is firm, knuckles turning white too quickly while her other hand clutches to the lapel of his charcoal grey suit jacket.

She's scared of letting him go.

But all he does is stay frozen above her, his lips still on her forehead as his eyes drop shut while he breathes in deeply, trying to settle the war of emotions building inside of him. He will not let the tears fall. He wants; needs to be strong for her. It takes a few moments and two extra heart tugging apologies through tears before Emily does her best to go back to normal, go back compartmentalizing like she has learned nearly twenty five years ago and perfected just eight years ago, trying to put a haul on the sniffles that continue.

"Shhh… shhh… shhh…"

She tries a few times more, taking in the gulps of thick air. He removes his lips from her forehead and travels down the four and a half inches to her dry and cut lip. Not caring, Hotch brushes his lips over hers. He tastes the sweetness of her lips and the saltiness of those beads of water before settling down at the edge of the seat. He palms her right cheek, careful not to touch the seven stitches near his thumb as he dries the tears.

"Did-did you get him?"

She shoves the question that holds her past and future out her mouth. He watches while she feels a fast falling tear from the corner of her eye seeping into the pillow. And when he doesn't respond immediately, the glazed look of his pupil becoming even more visible as their joined and lacing fingers firm even more, Emily knows his answer.

The uncertainties she's currently facing.

"But we will."

Hotch scoots closer to her on the seat. Pressing the back of her hand to his mouth once before leaning forward to only have hardly an inch between their faces, he whispers with nothing but assurance.

"_I will._"

Almost instantly, she shakes her head. It hurts; her head. Every part of her, everything in her, everywhere around her does in actuality. From her aching limbs to her punctured organs, to those blurry thoughts of her future, _their_ future, she think, knows that perhaps the thing that hurts more than anything in every part of her body is the man before her by her side.

In two days since she hasn't set her eyes on him, he has gotten thinner and even older. Those lines on his face she has always enjoyed touching because those meant the years and hard work he has given over to everyone, to the job increases on his forehead and the sides of his cheeks and the corner of his eyes. The circles permanent under his gaze even if he gets a full night of rest have grown darker. The terse line his mouth usually forms has the corners up as he does his best presently to smile for her. And his eyes; that intense yet soft stare on her she has loved and squirmed under is nothing but simply broken because of her. The brown pupils she has gazed into in so many positions, in so many places, standing beside him, lying with him are glassy and darker ever.

She catches her own broken expression in them.

"It's going to be okay…" The hand that has remained on her head strokes gently at her unwashed and dusty hair. "It's going to be _okay_…"

Left to right her head moves. "I never meant to hurt you. You _have_ to know that?"

The curve of his lips lifts the slightest whilst he tucks a few strands of her hair back. "I know… I know… don't cry… shhh…"

A nod Emily gives him before trying through the tears she hopes will stop even if it will be only a bit. She moistens her lips, feeling the cuts. His thumb rubs against her knuckles, her hand still cold like ice.

"You're cold?" he asks.

Through the lingering water at the edge of her eyes and the wet cheek he's wiping at, she offers, tries to at least, him her own tender sad upward twist of her mouth.

"I'm okay," she murmurs.

Just a little though. But she had seen no extra blankets around. She hadn't even remembered asking for one when the nurse checked on her and gave her a spoonful of ice chips she requested. And she doesn't want him to leave to go ask for one. She doesn't want to become an even bigger burden then she currently is. She just wants, needs him to stay with her.

Regardless the blanket already tucked tight beneath her arms he tugs up some still despite her words because Hotch thinks she might be lying. She feels like ice. A quick glimpse around her room, what he wants not in sight, he gently releases her hand and shrugs off his suit jacket with the drying spots of raindrops and covers her lightly. Her body warms immediately, the scent of his suit jacket and that something spicy and piney scent rise into her nose. But those two words of gratitude and appreciation are lost on her.

She doesn't deserve him. She has done nothing to warrant him here, him in her life.

He takes her hand in his once again. "How do you feel?" He feels rather foolish asking, but nonetheless, the question is asked with his eyes scanning her face and traveling to the wound on her stomach he knows of.

Emily inhales through her tight chest and says softly and nearly playfully to her best attempt because she feels the cuts, the bruises and the stitches lingering all over her face, she doesn't doubt she looks like pure and utter hell, "As good as I look."

"You look _beautiful_."

A lump forms in her throat. If he sees every part of her, all of her, the damage that is done to her body, the mark, the reminder of Ian Doyle on her flesh, he won't think so anymore. He'll be more repulse than she is.

Hotch shifts the couple of inches back from her while she sniffles. Their hands are still joined. Her other she raises gently to cup his cheek. He turns his head quickly, puckering his mouth into the palm of her hand.

Always she will to him.

Regardless of their present setting, of the circumstances that surround them, of the way the dark hues that have taken over her porcelain skin, she does in his eyes. His compliment, one that he delivers now like the thousand and one times he has whisper into her ear with the utmost sincerity and love tugs on her heartstrings hard while for the first time in how long she can hardly remember, the faintest chuckle that mixes with another sniffle comes from her and tickles him.

Drip drop. Drip drop. Drip drop.

His eyes set with hers again, for the next few minutes, listening to the sounds of the monitor and the fat raindrops hit against her window, the lights from outside adding a glow in the room; Emily continues to palm his cheek. The tip of her thin middle finger grazes the lines at the corner of his eye. She has missed it, this. Touching his face, feeling the lines beneath her skin, it's something she never has taken for granted. And it has been something she hasn't done for too long even if it has only been ten days.

"I've missed you..."

Hotch turns once more to set another kiss into her hand. Unlike last time, he remains still longer. Eyes dropping shut, mouth to her palm, she hears his shallow breaths. Those nights for the last ten days as he would be on his side, wondering what was happening to them, his eyes would close. And almost immediately, he would feel it. Her hand threading through the sides of his short black hair before it settled onto his cheek with her thumb always grazing back and forth as he hummed in content. The feel of her touch on his skin, sending the sparks and calm speeding through his veins, he has missed more than he can perhaps ever explain.

"Aaron…"

Her soft voice and the gentle push of his face make him return his attention back to her.

Silent he is.

Yet his eyes are loud. Exhaustion and love is screaming in them and Emily registers the waves of fear she has witness every now then flickering beneath the light of the room.

The words in her head are mixed up together like a bowl of alphabet soup. She doesn't know how to ask, more or less where to start this. She doesn't even know if this is a good or smart idea. Will she be just hurting him all over again because his expressions, the thoughts about finding everything she never planned on telling him has been burning in the back of her brain for the past six weeks.

But all she knows for certain is that it might be now or never for her, for them because the man that is lingering in her head with ice blue eyes she will remember forever managed to escape again. He's on his way to search the world for the son he loved and lost and the little boy who she needed to protect and save. It will be his goal until he dies. Yet if he learns once more that the woman who he had put his confidence in, whether it be the identity she had perfected for him or the real identity she is at the very moment is alive for the second time, he will be back and surprise her. He will make certain there isn't going be a third time she will rise again.

She will bet everything on it.

So how long he can stay, _she _can stay, and what other opportunity she will get for this with him, she's unsure of.

There is no other option.

"I-I needed to… protect you…"

That is how she will start. Her voice struggles and shakes with the heart lodging in her throat. Arm over the low bar of the side if her bed; Hotch places a hand on her covered thigh. Her own hand covers it and her fingers curl around it within seconds.

"I couldn't tell you. I wanted more than anything to tell you, but I just _couldn't_ because…" She feels her lungs wanting to shut inside of her and wets the corners of her mouth. "Doyle had eyes on me… on all of you… and- and I just wanted to protect all of you… and Declan…"

The little boy who was no longer that after these seven years and growing up in some part of the world, he needed to be safe too.

Following the news of an unbreakable Doyle locked up somewhere she didn't know where and the profile that Interpol had sent back, demanding more inside information, Emily was terrified. She didn't have a choice. He couldn't be a pawn. So she had spent the day splashing Declan in crimson paint and coloring and dusting and rubbing the dirt all over his face and clothes through his fits of giggle at the excitement of playing dead guy while she had laughed herself because the sound had been too infectious. And she set up the camera, carefully placed the strip of duct tape over his smiling face before telling him to do his best to look sad for her.

As the flashbulb had gone off, Emily had held the unloaded gun to his head.

He couldn't stop laughing afterwards. She couldn't stop the pounding of her heart.

The next day as the clock struck five in the morning, Emily had been kneeling on the ground in the near empty Boston Logan International Airport. She had done her best to hold in all her tears all morning. They built up anyway and she had sniffled once and twice too many times quietly.

To San Francisco they would be going.

But after that, the bank account in their new names and directions to withdraw the money and go as far as possible from any of Doyle's familiar locations, _anywhere _but the place, the city and country that was home, Emily was certain seeing them again, seeing his son again, hearing his sweet voice and laugh would be slim to never.

It had to be done. It was for the best. It was for his protection.

A backpack filled with coloring books and paper with a box of crayons with sixty four colors, a set of stories about the monkey who lived in the city with the man in the big yellow hat she knew was his absolute favorite and three brand new toy cars the size of his small hand was slung on his tiny shoulders. She had run a hand over his short blonde hair, a haircut she had decided to give him just the night before following the photos. It wasn't the best looking cut, but it had to do. It would grow back again. Declan had clenched the stuffed grey monkey with the soft grey faux fur around the neck as the pair of glassy eyes of a woman four feet away from them looked on with the plane tickets and passports in her hands.

"You're not coming?" His face had dropped, the realization that the fun vacation she had told him all about would be without her, a frown appeared before her eyes.

Emily had smiled faintly and shook her head. "No, I'm going to have to stay for a while longer, okay? But you know what… you're going with your mommy… and you're just going to have _so much fun_… you won't even remember I'm not there…" she had whispered to him. "So be a good boy for her… and me…"

His wide blue eyes had welled up with water while he begged in his squeaky and high voice, "But I want _you_ to come with me."

She had wasted no time to pull him into a hug, allowing a few tears to slip away and drop into the Shamrock green sweater he wore. "I know… I know…" Pulling away, unable to hide the wetness of her cheeks, she had playfully kissed him on the nose like so many times since she has met him.

"But I can't… not right now, okay?"

Not ever she had heard in the back of her mind.

Then Declan had asked hopefully, "Soon?"

And all Emily could have done was smile even more, the pain nailing into her heart as she lied, "Yeah… soon."

A sigh he released, his tiny lips still in a frown while she had brushed her thumb across his soft skin. But before she could have told him to go, tell him goodbye for the final time, Declan had handed the cotton filled animal to her and wiggled off his backpack. Tugging the zipper around and opening the bag, all the items she had brought for him came into view again. She had watched silently through her watery eyes as his hands flipped the few lightly crinkled pieces of paper he had stuck back in hurriedly upon arrival. The early car ride in the middle of the morning had him coloring in the back seat to distract him from the quiet and difficult conversation she had in the front.

He pulled out a piece of white paper; the corners curled a touch and handed it to her with a minute and sad beam on his face.

"Here… I made this for you," he whispered before sucking in his bottom lip.

A single flower with alternating purple and red petals, her favorite colors, and a yellow center on a long thick green stem with three leaves with an accompany figure in a magenta dress and black shoes and the wavy brown hair he attempted to recreate beside it. And her name, Lauren, had been written underneath messily in robin's egg blue with a backwards 'r' and a missing 'e.'

Sniffles and tears came out quickly while Emily had wrapped her arms around the little boy.

"_I love it_," she had told to him.

For a good one hundred and twenty seconds she had held onto him. Some things weren't fair. This wasn't fair. Pulling away once more had been the feeling of being ripped apart in reality for her. She had clutched onto the picture, still folded in quarters tucked inside her copy of _Jane Eyre_ now that she hasn't touched since while zipping up the backpack and helping it back onto him before returning the stuffed monkey. Emily had finally stood up then and moved with Declan to the woman waiting four feet away. But before he walked away and out of her life, one bigger hug than before and a kiss on his cheek the little boy had asked for and she was more than happy to give. She received the latter in return too. She had turned to Louise then, giving her a hug as well while whispering to her the soft words of thankfulness and saying a silent prayer that they will be safe.

Declan waved at her, his small and short arm going back and forth one final time standing at the gate entry way as he smiled at her, thinking he would have been seeing her soon.

That had been her last image of him.

Emily threw up in the airport bathroom minutes later and she didn't sleep for nearly two weeks subsequently.

"I was going to do anything and everything to make sure _everyone_ was safe and… I know you would have too. _All of you_ would have done anything and everything to protect me..." Hotch watches the tears in her eyes form once more. "But it wasn't _your_ fight. Not a _single_ second of it… and putting you and everyone else in the middle of it wasn't an option… it was out of the question for me because if something happened to _you_… any of you… I wouldn't… I wouldn't be able to forgive myself…" Her voice trails away for a brief moment as she inhales and exhales steadily.

This part will be harder than the last two hundred seconds.

"And I was afraid…"

She can't help the dip of her voice and tremble of her aching body.

"I was _so _afraid of you… of what you would think of me… if you found out… about me… and him… and what I did…"

Instantly Hotch knows what she means, who she is referring to and he can't help it but shift his gaze downcast to settle on their hands together resting on her covered legs because instantly images of her with Ian Doyle appear in his head. His lips marking her skin while their sticky bodies pressed together as he pushed into her and her moans fill the bedroom of that Tuscan villa are too vivid.

He's not a jealous man. He never really was, never really is. But with her and at the moment, those thoughts rising up once again are making him one.

"I don't want to lie to you..." Hotch feels her shake her head. "I don't want to keep anything from you..." His heartbeat is quickening. "He was good to me…" Emily holds back the sob that wants to be let out. "After everything he has done… whatever you've found out about… he was _so_ good to me…"

That he was.

The anger that would rise in him when everything he demanded didn't go as planned, the hardness of his voice when he made his orders and the roughness of his fist and ultimately the way he handed a weapon when he picked out the snitches and the traitors, she never experienced. Not for one second did he ever allow her to witness and experience that part of him firsthand. That entirely she had only heard from profiles and rumors. Everything he made her feel had felt like nothing but safety because no one new was to ever come in direct contact with her without his presence. Everything he said to her in his thick Irish accent had been nothing but sweet and charming. And everything he did to her with his callous hands had been nothing but tender and loving.

Her hold she has on his hand firms. Emily thinks he might leave any second; walking out the door and building and perhaps out her life filled with regret of what he himself had given to her as well.

His heart; the biggest bet he made that March night in Atlantic City.

"He loved me _so_ much…"

That he did.

Four months after he had told her so those three little words after the year and a half since she first infiltrated in; in bed and naked after, Doyle rolled off of her with a content smile.

"You ever think about getting married, Lauren?" His head had turned to his right, finding her breathing hard still with her ample chest going up and down and her light brown colored wavy hair spread wildly across the pillow beneath her head.

The question had taken her aback, wondering how he had even thought of it. Nevertheless, she, Lauren, had laughed then, the sugary sound flowing through the master bedroom of his Tuscan Villa before simply replying, "I'm not the marrying type."

What she didn't see, but sensed had been the rise of his eyebrows. "And why is that, my love?" The endearment out his mouth in his accent had so many times prior sent her blood rushing.

Once she twisted her eyes to him though, a content smile on her face to match his, after thinking for a moment, she had informed him matter-of-factly. "Because… I'm just not."

Doyle had reached out, pushing back her damp bangs. "Hmm… so I guess that's out of the question for you… and me?" he inquired with his still content curve of his lips.

His tone though had been the slightest disappointed she recognized. Yet quietly it had been pushed to the side, pretending it was non existent. Slowly she had closed the space between them, climbing onto him and having their naked chest together for another time in the night and him pressing against her thighs. And once she, Lauren, had leaned down to set a peck to his lips as he had held onto her tightly. The slight disappointment she heard and pushed away had been felt in their kiss.

"Yeah… it is," she had told him with the trace of sadness in her voice she heard.

One month later, after presenting him with the missiles he was hoping for with suspicious glares from his men at her direction and the promise to take care of her that only meant his kisses and his touch, in the car in the middle of nowhere surrounded by sheep, his heart and his trust Doyle had given to her.

The gimmel ring hanging on a thick gold chain because he remembered clearly what she had told him that one night in bed. She wasn't the marrying type. So he had hoped it would have been alright. A ring she didn't have to wear on her finger, but a ring she could keep near her chest, her heart. Lauren- Emily- had been in awe at the ring, at the man. And the patience she had with him, assuming he would eventually tell her all he did, his business, disappeared.

He was Valhalla.

Their future he wasn't sure of. But one thing he had been sure of was her.

Her in his life he just wanted.

Still his eyes continue to be away from her and downcast. Hotch doesn't want to admit it out loud, but hearing it from her mouth, listening to this, pains him more than the thoughts. But he thinks that it pains even more for her. Having to reveal secrets she has buried for so long, it isn't easy for anyone he is certain of.

"And a part of me did too..."

The seven words Emily puts together in her broken voice pierces through him is the truth because somehow, somewhere along the way, a part of her had fell for, felt _something _for the dangerous man who killed with his hands and handled the most deadly weapons.

When she had been first offered the assignment, learning of the takedown they planned for the former captain of the Provisional Irish Republican Army, it was her Clyde Easter believed who would be the best. She was to be the weapon that would be used.

"Why me?" she had questioned with a furrowed brow.

That had been when she discovered that the dangerous man they were after had eyes for women that looked like her. Light brown hair with the pale skin and big eyes, women like her was what made him weak.

Emily Prentiss was to be his weakness.

She had hesitated though. She had read and heard all about Ian Doyle. An arms dealer who killed with no regret, felt no remorse and made deals and form friendships with criminals from all over the continent of Europe. Not only that, she knew what was really meant. She would have to use herself. She would have to pretend to be someone else all over again. After fifteen years, Emily would have to go back to her old ways. Yet she had also recognized the opportunity of it. The demise of a wanted man and serving and honoring her job, her position, she had said yes.

Trepidation flowed through her blood every second.

Three weeks that came too early, the night meeting for the very first time in the Boston pub and wearing the mask of Lauren Reynolds and playing her cards just right with the seductive flutters of her lashes, Ian Doyle had taken the first step into his downfall while she, Emily Prentiss, had taken her first step back into compartmentalizing. The technique she had learned at the age of fifteen to hide her heartache and wrapped in the thick veil of shame and stupidity when she found herself sleeping with the boys that seemed to line themselves up after rumors spread that she was the easy one because acceptance was what she desired the most, Emily had found herself doing it once again. She had to contain the shear repulsive of flirting with him. Nonetheless she laughed and chatted up with him because she had to. And what she had slowly seen was the charm about him. His accent, his deep laugh and his blue eyes that would stare at her for too long had given a chill down her spine.

They spent three hours together that night.

In the following weeks after he learned about her, Lauren, as much as possible and in between secret meetings with her team and accompaniment with him to his own secret meetings, Lauren had managed to weave a little of herself into his inner circle all the while Emily felt the walls she built and the boxes from compartmentalizing sway so often unexpectedly. Maybe it was the undercover job, the missing her apartment and all the things she was familiar that had caused her to let her guard even for the slightest moments when he talked to her, hoping to make her laugh and grin which she had did without force.

But it was perhaps what Doyle had asked of her to do eight weeks later that might have taken her by surprise and caused the first violent shake of the walls.

"Come with me… to Ireland."

That trip to Ireland hadn't been what Emily expected. It had been only her that was with him. They had driven down dirt roads in the middle of nowhere and a part of her had worried the slightest, wondering if he had found out her true identity, thinking he might just torture her in private before putting a bullet between her eyes. Yet she had masked it all with her curious and flirtatious glances over her shoulder that made him chuckle in the night. To her amazement where he had brought her to was a house in open space. Nothing but green grass and the structure present. It was a place for him to hide away if and whenever necessary. Of his modest two stories home that less than a handful of people in his most inner circle knew about, it had been nothing too fancy or extravagant like the profile that was made for him. And what he had planned for her inside was dinner and his confession that he had told her almost shyly.

He was smitten with her. He wanted her.

Then Doyle had leaned into her, slowly and hesitantly moving his mouth to hers as he cupped her face. It was soft, the kiss. He had been nervous. This man, the dangerous man on the top of a most wanted list had been nervous to kiss her. Gradually she kissed him back, knowing this was part of the plan, but finding it rather nice. The latter part had scared her. She had pulled away, a titter mixing with her uneven breathing as a blush crept into her cheeks.

"Um… that was…" Lauren had stuttered because Emily had been perhaps speechless.

Doyle himself had chuckled, meeting her eyes and grinning crookedly before remarking, "That was… nice."

Finding herself nodding in agreement because words were still lost to her, before she registered it, he had leaned down and captured her mouth again.

Lauren had slept with him that night. Emily had felt her walls collapsing.

Sleeping with him had been different, _much_ different than she anticipated. He had been gentle, loving and handled her as if she was his porcelain doll. His mouth nibbling on her skin, his hands gliding over the permanent black ink on her body and his thrusts steady until she had heard herself asking him between her moans and his grunts to go a little faster and push a little harder because it felt_ so _good, Emily had found the lines that separated her from Lauren and Lauren from her blurring a touch.

The days, the weeks and the months that came after had those lines becoming more difficult to see. Her job she continued to do so. Gathering the bits and pieces of information and his declaration that he in fact was Valhalla, she gave away without hesitation. Emily told them all she saw and heard. However the words Doyle would murmur to her at night, alone and in bed, she kept to herself. The time she spent with him, she found herself enjoying. Even with the sudden excuse breaks to the bathroom to splash cold water on her face to wake herself up and remember who he really was and what she was there to do, the feeling of comfort she felt with him couldn't be shaken off. Compartmentalizing the feeling of pleasure building in the pit of her stomach with him, it never stayed inside the little black boxes in her for too long. And going to Tuscany for the dozen time in real life, but a very first of many in Lauren's life, Emily had watched him run after with the little boy with the lightest blond hair and the widest blue eyes in rounds and rounds of tag barefoot in the backyard before both would plot and chase her around. His care and attention for the son of just the housekeeper and his constant shower of gifts for him had made her see him in even more differently than she was already doing.

Emily had felt her entire world turning surreal.

And the one early Sunday afternoon in June, watching her chase the four year old trying to crawl around the dark brown cherry wood coffee table before she had caught him and attacked him with tickles he loved immensely, Doyle had asked what she had thought about many times late at night, what she had given up once upon a time ago at the age of fifteen, and what she had thought about a few times with _him_ because they did so many things without the proper protection.

Kids.

The nervousness had risen in her with her chuckle and hands on her hips position. Their jobs, their environment weren't the ideal place to raise a family. But calm he had been, wondering aloud if she would though. With the right man and a son who loved her, would the family life be in her sights. And then he had revealed one piece of information that made her heart pound. What he had told her once upon a time ago on that first trip when she had met Declan Jones who stayed with his housekeeper mother all year round in his gated and guarded Tuscan villa was a lie.

Declan was his.

Protection for him in case anyone would ever find out his true identity and use him for the worse.

Emily had suddenly recognized the mix and mess of everything then. The lying he did, the lying she continued to do so, identities and names were nothing but an illusion for safety and security.

Doyle had remained talking, hoping she would become what he wanted her to be. A mother to take care of Declan and to raise him with the love he needed. She couldn't do that. And it was his eager offer to get her out that had caused her heart throb even more. He would've done anything to keep her safe, done anything to keep her in his life, Declan's life she had understood then. A moment with his words in her head spinning, there had been one thing that flashed into her head while staring at him in shock of what he was proposing and in fear of what could happen in the future.

She could get him out. She had the resources, the contacts. And Declan would be safer. Declan would have his father.

For the three seconds that he didn't answer and their unwavering gazes on each other, she had hoped Doyle would say yes. He would get out. It would be difficult at first, but it would be alright. He would have Declan and maybe if the cards were fixed right, he would have her too. The family he wanted for his son, he could be a part of it too if he left. If he loved her like he told her, if his words of hoping to protect Declan were as true as he said, he would drop it all for her and him.

Ian Doyle could start all over.

But his reluctance, his impossibility to not live up to the definition of his name, to not raise a warrior himself, and his question if the life he was already living and the life he would be handing down could be, was so bad, Lauren- Emily- had stared in disbelief and felt the anger rising in her.

She couldn't do it, raise Declan only for him to lead the same life, run this empire his father was building, she knew he didn't deserve. She would do a lot of things for him, and in the depths of her brain and heart, Emily knew it was the truth. But this she couldn't do it. And once the little boy who had stolen a piece of her heart in their first encounter had came sauntering back, unknown that his future had been drawn up for him, she had knelt down beside the little boy, holding him and smoothing out his long blonde hair, Lauren- Emily- the lines still unclear in the light told him she wouldn't do it. She had whispered, telling his son to go to his father.

The sight of Declan grasping his father's side, both sharing the same pair of blue eyes and staring at her with adoration, puzzlement and dejection, the picture, the scene in front of her, Emily knew it would be impossible to ever have. If things could be different, if they had done things differently, if they had met differently, it could have been different. But they couldn't, they hadn't and it wasn't. So all Emily had done was turn around, realizing perhaps the stupidity and the danger of wanting, even considering the situation before fingering the gold chain that hung around her neck with the gimmel ring and walking away.

She had done her best to avoid him for the remainder of the afternoon. And at night, sitting in the reading room at the end of the villa, Emily had her legs curled under her beneath the thin blanket as she stared out the large window aimlessly and tried to erase that small desire she had continue to flame inside. Doyle had found her, walking in quietly and sitting beside her with half a dozen inches in between as the tiny bumps rose on her skin. For minutes it had been hushed until he had leaned forward with elbows on his knees and informed her of something else.

"She died… an hour after she gave birth…" he whispered and once she turned her head, the glassiness of his blue eyes were apparent. "She kept it a secret… the name she chose. Declan… he didn't get his name until one week later… after I found the book in her drawer. There was a star next to it..."

His chuckled was bittersweet memory he never told anyone until then unknown to her. All Emily had known was tightening in her chest.

"I want Declan to have a mother. He _needs _a mother… _and_ I want _you_." Doyle had moved close to her, the six inches disappearing.

This wasn't meant to happen. She had never thought this would have gotten so far. Yet it did. The hole she had tripped into, she didn't know if she wanted to climb out of anymore. But she knew she was supposed to. She needed to because if she would take off her mask, he would see and she would remember clearly that this wasn't her real life. She had opened her mouth, feeling the water in her eye rise as her mind spun.

"Ian… I just-"

She had watched as he had shaken his head. "I know what you said, love." A crooked and small grin plastered on his face. "But what you _say_ and what I _see_ on your face… isn't the same, Lauren."

He had leaned in, cupping her face and capturing her trembling lips in his. It had been sweet, his mouth burning against hers and setting the alarms off in her head, Lauren- Emily- didn't push him away.

She just couldn't.

Three months after that day, fixing the garden of purple freesias because those were his favorite, the raid had occurred.

Doyle was arrested.

The last shot of him for her had been of him dressed in white like her standing up in the balcony. His eyes had been on her being shoved into and sitting the black government vehicle. He had nodded ever so slightly. It will be alright. She shouldn't talk. He'll fix it.

Yet he never did get his chance though.

The accident on a Tuscan road was faked nine weeks after.

Lauren Reynolds was dead.

That was what had been told to him by whomever in wherever he may have been. She had wondered that night. In her own home alone where she had heard creaks and footsteps from everywhere, lying in her own cold bed missing the warmth of his rough body, Emily had wondered if he had cried because she had. She had felt the tears trickling down her face, through her splayed newly dark locks because she had dyed it back to the seal brown and cut it short because the mask was no longer necessary before they had soaked into the cotton pillow case.

Losing Lauren meant losing him, losing them. And a part of her hadn't wanted to.

She loved him, them; both father and son.

Lauren did.

And Emily had too.

She didn't know how long it had taken for her thoughts to stop drifting back to him, both of them. She didn't know how long it had taken before she realized the mistake she had made by allowing Doyle in and allowing her guard to fall. She didn't know how long it had taken before she stopped wondering if Declan would remember her again if by some miracle she would see him again.

Maybe months; she honestly hadn't had a clue.

But they did.

Busy she had found herself. Her fresh new start in the bureau, working her way to gain the confidence of every member of the team she sees as her family, especially the man she is clinging onto because he had given her a chance on that she took without hesitation and lived up to his expectations and more. The man who had given her more possibilities than she could have ever thought imaginable and hope for love with the continuing time she spent with him and his son that in the strangest sense Emily realizes suddenly could resemble the father and son pairing she had fell for so long ago.

The shudder crawls along her spine.

Without looking up, Hotch knows the tears are building up faster than because the sob she has been doing her very best to suppress slice through the pelts of raindrops and the sharp beeps.

"_I'm sorry_…"

From the tears and from the coolness of the room as well for the reason that her hands are growing icier by the seconds, every part of her trembles and feels cold.

"_Please say something_…"

And dead because he remains wordless as she feels the distance growing between them.

What she doesn't realize, know is that those last seven words prior to her apology, her beg for him to talk, she didn't have to tell him. He had a feeling. A burning feeling searing through his head and heart he has been feeling ever since he was shown the gold ring with the clasped hands on the thick gold chain and the meaning of such a gift between two people flowed into his ears.

Even after so long, she kept it. Why Doyle would have given it to her in the first place, why she had kept it after years, eight years to be exact, the pieces of information of her past and what she did and what she never told him had fit nearly seamlessly. People who keep things like these, like _that_, like how the profiles he does daily reads, only do it because some part of them can't let go. Whether it is wholly or just partially, some part of the item still has a string or two tied back to an inescapable past someone has. It's sentimental. It means _something_.

So he knew.

He knows.

She had simply confirmed what he had been trying to block out.

For minutes they're still and silent. Words overflow in his head. The emotions increase inside his heart. Hotch himself doesn't know where to start or how to start.

"My biggest regret…" His voice is hoarse and too thick as he begins to stop the train of thoughts that speed inside his head.

Drip drop. Drip drop. Drip drop.

In between the raindrops and the sharp sounds of the monitor, Emily thinks the other noise she hears is her heart cracking too fast. Regretting her, regretting them will hurt more than all the bruises and cuts and stitches on her.

Hotch swallows hard, attempting to moisten his dry throat.

"My biggest regret… is that night in Charleston…"

Softly his thumb moves across her skin. He inhales sharply, air into his lungs seemingly difficult. "If I could, I would go back to that night… and I would do… and say so many things differently…" he whispers, his words quiet in the room yet loud into her ears.

Emily wants him to look at her.

"I was… hurt…"

The simple truth he informs her of that she doesn't expect any less of. Yet the information sends an arrow into her heart.

"I don't want to lie to you either… and tell you I wasn't… because I was. I was hurt that you couldn't talk to _me_... tell _me _what was wrong, _trust me_ and even after I confronted you… I was hurt and a part of me had been angry that you lied right to my face… " All she needs more than ever is for him to look at her. "And after that… I was confused. I didn't know what was going on with you… and with us… I was all of that…"

Hotch doesn't however because his gaze remains set on their joined hands and his moving thumb.

"When I called you… when we had found out it was _you_… and I called you and found your phone…" That second Saturday of the month of December floods into his mind once more like clockwork. "And everything else you put inside sitting right in the middle of your drawer… even the stress ball…" For a split second he can't help the quick and unconscious twitch of his lips before she sees it vanishing. "I wasn't hurt or angry or confused. I was… I was just worried… terrified that something had happened already…" He takes a deep breath. That war of emotions going on inside of him he wants to contain, wants to stop is becoming too difficult. And in his exhale, it's shaky and undeniable he wants, _needs_ to break.

"That I already lost you _too_…"

One of his biggest fears he never tells anyone, never says aloud is losing the people around. For as long as he can recall, this fear of his has always been present. But it has been his profession; this job that has defined him and made him who he is that has heightened this fear of his. Because of him, because he can't protect them, help them, save them, like he's supposed to, like he has to, he fails them in the end.

Fifteen months ago, on a sunny November afternoon, losing Haley had his fear becoming reality.

Three days ago, that fear of his had become that once more. A reality that had been a big black hole in the ground and all he had found himself was falling further and further down and further and further away from her. The discovery of her running, of her somewhere alone on her own mission and losing the battle because he hadn't been there to protect her, help her, save her like he's supposed to, like he has to.

And in the end, it would have been just like before.

He would have found her too late. Her body would have been lying on the ground bloody, covered with bruises and no pulse. All he could have done was hug her lifeless form close to him, water streaming down his face, her warmth fading faster every second, her blood staining his clothes and bleeding into his skin and that would have been their face to face goodbye.

His tears and her silence would have been the only words.

The picture before his gaze grows hazy.

"But then I thought about you… and how strong I know you are and… you're a fighter. Through everything you do, you're a fighter. And everything you do… and everything you do has a reason behind it. And I understood... I understood… what you wanted to do and what you thought you had to do. I don't agree with it because you're right…" His last two words are said dejectedly. Hotch looks up finally at her then. She's grateful, the mere simplicity of eye contact with him has relief wrapping around her aching bones. But the tears in his eyes are unavoidable with his glassy stare sharp and even with hers makes it unbearable. "_I_ would have done _everything_ to protect _you_…" The words are whispered through clenched teeth steadily and determined and for the briefest moment, the broken of his voice breaks even more than she thought possible. "I _still_ will… because if something had happened to _you_… if something happens… I wouldn't have forgiven myself…but I understand…" he whispers meekly.

Her eyes trace his features, embedding every detail visible on his face into her head all the while he feels his lungs wanting to collapse as another deep inhale he quietly sucks in feels more difficult than before. He stops looking at her once more as he directs his focus back to their hands. His left hand resting on her covered legs and tucked under hers with her fingers curling around it, Hotch slowly flips his over.

Palm to palm; his fingertips glide along her thin fingers. They seem almost fragile, breakable if he presses onto them too hard. They're still slightly cold, but it's better than before he thinks. They have the slightest of a tremor as he moves through them. For minutes, it's calm between them again while Emily alternates her gaze between their hands and his face. His grazes lead him to the forth finger, his touch lingers on the base. He's brushing back and forth and with his eyes away from hers and his head just a touch lower; she can see the terse line of his thin lips. Whatever he is thinking of, whatever that is running around in his head, and how he is currently feeling, will impact them. Whether for good or for bad, it has her heart ready to pop out any second she's more than positive.

"Dave… he found the… he found the gimmel ring…"

He struggles with the information that she doesn't expect at all. She feels whatever, if any color remaining on her face dissipating too quickly. Someone had just dropped her from up in the sky in front of a speeding truck. Her glassy eyes grow big. His thumb continues to stroke that base of her fourth finger.

No, no, no, this _can't_ be happening.

She flushed it.

The first attempt of doing so, flushing his present years prior, she never had been able to completely do it. Always she would remember that afternoon every time she would hold it in her hand, ready to drop it down the porcelain bowl. The minute details she recalled. Their kiss they shared in the back seat of the second car with their tongues tangling, her desire to just leave and go somewhere private because she had wanted his body to cover hers again like the last time twelve days prior, and his admittance, his trust that he had ultimately handed over when he told her he indeed was Valhalla. Emily hadn't been able to let go. Some part of her had held on despite the mistake she knew she had made. So she couldn't do it. She had stuffed it back into the blue velvet pouch and into the back of her safe underneath the rest of her past.

But this time, three days ago, she had been finally able to do it. His escape, his threats to her, to the people she loved and cared about, and her mission to fix everything for everyone had been the sign that it was time to finally let go of the afternoon embedded into her brain and the past that surrounded her. She had flushed the token with his biggest wish wrapped around it down the toilet. It had swirled along the water when she had pushed down on the tiny lever. But she hadn't waited to see if it had gone down completely into the drains and into the ocean somewhere.

And now with this revelation, it is a careless mistake that will have endless of consequences for them now.

"It didn't flush… it wouldn't flush…"

Hotch takes in large gulps of air. He feels his heart throbbing.

"He asked you… to marry him?"

That speeding truck she had been dropped in front of has run her over and over again.

Emily nods lightly all the while the words she can't even keep track of dance out fearfully off her lips, "He wanted to…"

He wanted to _so_ badly.

Her answer, her voice shakes with the accompany sniffles.

"But I told him… I wouldn't… I _couldn't_…"

Little by little his eyes return to her, finding tears slipping down into her pillow she can't sense at all. Hotch merely bobs his head tersely, the question lingering in the back of his brain ever since the realization that years after she still kept that one thing. He doesn't think it's a need, but a mere want to ask.

"You wanted to…"

He murmurs the statement he had meant to be a question that catches her by surprise. Like the minutes ago she had begun to tell him her darkest secret, she doesn't want to lie to him, hide anything from him anymore.

"Yes… a part of me did… a part of me did…"

The words are hardly above a whisper. But hearing it; hearing her admit it aloud for the very first time to herself with him already broken by her side makes her want to kneel over a porcelain throne. Her body trembles. She thinks her stitches might rip. She'll start bleeding all over again. But it'll for a whole reason.

"_Please _… _please_… _please don't hate me_…"

Her heart wrenching voice and the broken plead blending with her attempts to hold in sobs causes the strokes on the base of her fourth finger to halt. Hotch twist his eyes back to her within seconds. Tears are falling like a steady stream down her face and soaking the pillow below. His gaze is soft and his expression is startled through her hazy sight. Their clasp hands since he had walked next to her bedside he releases unexpectedly for him to throw the arm over her head on the pillow. In moments he's so close to her once more that his chin is only centimeters from resting onto her pillow. His other hand he pulls from underneath her hand on her thigh to cradle her neck and face with his thick fingers splayed and digging into her flesh. And with the tender touch placed to the back of her head causing her to lean forward as their noses graze against each other's while their watery eyes hold onto one another, Hotch tells her one thing she should never worry about and be scared of

"_Nothing_…" His lips barely part at the single word she hears clearly. His warm breaths sear her skin. "_Nothing _can _ever _make me hate you..."

Without warning, a lone tear slides down his cheek.

He is supposed to stay strong for her. She's not supposed to see him weak.

Emily bites hard onto her bottom lip, cries coming out one after another without restraints as she brings a hand up to hold onto his touch burning her skin while the other reaches up and behind to grasp the nape of his neck.

"_Do you hear me_?" Almost frantically, she nods alongside him. "_Nothing will."_

He shifts the inch down, catching her lips in his, tasting mix of saltiness from her tears and the sweetness that is always her mouth. Hotch takes in the cries leaving without restraints anymore because he's supposed to. Hate her because right now, she thinks she hates herself for the pain she's causing him and everyone else she cares about.

But he doesn't and in this kiss, all she tastes is the truth, the sincerity and the certainty in his words.

After everything he has discovered, everything she has told him and everything they've been through these last few weeks, days, hours and even minutes, he doesn't. He won't ever because what he wants her to know, needs her to understand is that the way she is, is who he loves. What she did in the past, the secrets she was scared to tell him, doesn't change the way he sees her _now_ and the way he loves her _now_.

It doesn't even; _can't_ even compete.

A minute it takes before their lips part and a minute after it takes before her cries begin once again to subside and her breathing to try to return back to normal. Yet the closeness of their faces, and the hands on each other remains even after those two minutes as his chin gently rest on his pillow and he moves up to press his forehead to the edge of her temple. Little by little his eyes shut as well hers.

Then frozen they are together. Tired they are together with heavy eyelids. And with another few minutes ticking away, he hears their breathing beginning to synchronize too. Despite the room, the building, the beeps that still go through his ears, just being together after ten days of not speaking and after three weeks of a growing distance feels almost heaven like.

Drip drop. Drip drop. Drip drop.

If he can now, he would stop the world.

"Aaron…"

His eyelids slowly peel back at the faint sound of his name rolling off her tongue. All the crying she has done since he has gotten here is apparent in the swollenness of her eyes. The corners of are still moist. Her long curl lashes are in tiny clumps, sticking because of those tears.

A gentle grin forms before her. "Yeah?"

The tips of her fingers stroke the short hairs on the back of his neck while she draws in a breath.

"Can you… lay with me?"

All Emily wants is to feel as close to him as possible. She has not only missed touching his face, but she has missed that feel, the comfort, of his strong body by her side. But the flicker of reluctance she senses and sees in the quick second scan of the bed he does before retuning it to her.

"_Please_…"

The one word she always says that he can never resist and makes him surrender to her greatest wishes and desires is into his ears unlike any other of those hundred of times.

It's desperate and painful.

"Just… for a little while…"

A slight nod Hotch gives her while he stands slowly and her left hand drops to grasp his right. Standing over her, he debates for a moment. How to climb onto the bed that seems too big for her and too small for them. And he doesn't want to hurt her. He's a bit afraid that he might disrupt those tubes attached to her arm. Nevertheless though two steps to his left Hotch moves to before he sits on the edge of the thin mattress. The bed shifts from under his weight. But before he makes a another movement, behind him, Emily bites her bottom lip hard and grips onto the side of the bed trying to move even if it will be just an inch or two. A second hardly passes before he realizes what she's doing and places his hand on her knee.

"Don't move." She stops. "It's fine… just stay still…"

Two minutes it takes before he's successful in fulfilling her request.

He lies partially on his side with his legs slightly curled and his knees over hers. The space between her and the low bar that digs gently into his back on the side of her bed is perhaps ten inches or so. His left arm he has lightly over her covered chest as his large left hand is on her arms. She wonders briefly if he can feel the four leaf clover on her. The scent of something piney and spicy he always smells of dances up her nostrils more strongly than before. This close to her, his heartbeat is subtle but unmistakably beautiful.

"Are you comfortable?" He asks quietly.

A tender smile plays across her lips as she looks up at him.

"_Perfect._"

He presses his mouth to her forehead and tows his suit jacket up a bit more.

"Are you?"

Emily exhales gently, feeling a squeeze to her heart.

"_Perfect._"

Because being so close to her, making her happy is what makes it that.

Drip drop. Drip drop. Drip drop.

That tender smile manages to widen just by a centimeter or two before she shifts her gaze and tilts her head slightly down. And for a while then they are still once again.

Raindrops, beeps, breathing and heartbeats are all they hear.

The tension and tiredness in his body slowly releases. Despite the position, it simply feels good to be lying down. And with her now, he's grateful. Because while they stay in this frozen state, the world outside is moving, the secondhand of the clock hanging on the left wall behind him is turning and he wonders how much longer he still has with her.

_She can't stay._

His nose buries into the side of her head as sight of the rain outside disappears. He inhales, that smell of vanilla and blossoms he used to smell so powerfully on her is barely there. She smells mostly of the hospital. Yet there is the faintest trace and after the last ten days he thinks it's enough. Unconsciously the corners of his lips point up while her eyelids drop down.

They're getting heavier than before.

Emily wants to sleep. Her body hurts and everything inside of her aches. Sleep might make her feel less of that. And it's late. Yet what time it is to be precise, she has no idea because she doesn't have the energy to lift her head high enough to look at the clock on the wall or have the heart and courage to ask him now because time for them is always gold. It is precious and rich and one of the greatest treasures.

Especially now; she believes. More than ever it is just that.

And not only that, having him here, lying down beside her and feeling the warmth of his body radiate off when there was that impossibility of her surviving and given another moment together, she's scared to waste this moment on sleeping. On keeping her eyes closed for too long because she doesn't want it to pass by her. She's afraid of closing her eyes only to find him gone when she wakes up. So Emily opens them back up again and blinks rapidly.

Slowly the arm over her and his hand on her, she brings back with a gentle grasp of his elbow. His right hand is still holding onto her right. Her head turns up. Propping his elbow up a touch above them as Hotch has turn his attention to what she loves doing; her hand travels gingerly up until she reaches her destination. Then her tiny hand glides against his large one. Smoothness against callousness, the contrast of their touches is one of her favorite things.

"I love your hands, you know that?"

A breathless chuckle flows out her mouth as her thumb brushes his palm and he hums.

"They're so beautiful... so wonderful…"

They mold her like no one else has ever done. They leave marks she can never erase and never want to. They make her toes curl and her eyes roll back with pleasure.

"One of my favorite things… about you…"

Her fingers thread through his before she curls them, grasping tightly. He wastes no moment bringing his fingers down.

And together their hands are. All she can see, all he can think about is the flawlessness.

They fit so seamlessly.

It's hushed, and their clasped hands are still above them for another sixty seconds before gently they're tugged down. He's watching her. She brings the back of his hand to her mouth, the hairs on the back of his hand tickling her as her eyes close and she puckers lightly to press her lips to his flesh. Yet after she bestows the gesture on him, she doesn't move. Still she is like a stone for minutes. However the grip she has on him tightens.

If she can now, she would stop the world.

"Aaron…" she murmurs inaudibly.

He doesn't respond, only continuing to stare at her with her mouth near his skin while her chest heaves. Her eyes open. With the view of her profile, the corner of her eye is unmistakably occupied by a large drop of water. And once Emily twists her head, meeting him and their faces just a mere two and a half inches apart, her gaze is filled up with salty water yet again as her voice trembles and cracks.

"I'm _so _scared…"

Hotch tilts his head forward all the while water stream down her face so freely yet for another time.

Drip drop. Drip drop. Drip drop.

He doesn't know if it's her teardrops or raindrops he hears.

She hasn't cried like this in twenty five years. Not since she was slapped in the face with two thick blue lines on two little white sticks. After so long, after years of learning how to organize and box everything up, she doesn't know how to control it now. She doesn't know how to stop. The recent weeks, the passing days and the last minutes that continue to tick away and the future that seems greyer and final for her, for them, she doesn't know how to stop them.

"_I'm so scared_, _Aaron_…"

Their joined hand he lets go to put on her head before he pushes her head close. He wonders if she knows he is too because she can't stay, not like this, not right now because he's still out there somewhere. And if he discovers that she made it through, that the woman he had given everything to, the one he wanted to spend his life with and to raise his son and the woman who betrayed him is still alive and made it through for the second time, he'll come back. Doyle will hunt for her like an animal and make sure the third time will be the final time.

"I know… shhh… I know…"

Emily shakes her head gently. "What am I going to do?"

Feeling his own tears building up like before, he directs her tenderly, "Look at me… look at me, Emily… _look at me_…"

Her eyes open, water still falling down fast as he makes swift to brush them away.

"_I will_ get him, okay?" This sight of her is tearing through every part of him inside. "I will do _everything_ to get him… and _you're_ going to be safe and- and you're going to be okay because I won't let him hurt you. _Not ever. I won't_ stop until I find him."

Again she moves her head gently from side to side. He can't do that. She doesn't want him living his life like that. She can't let him do that to himself. Fighting her battle, burying his hectic schedule and living his life finding a dangerous man, he had already did that once. And he had lost himself in it. He had lost so much and let the good things pass him by because of it. Already with what she has made him endure, made him feel and think about, she still fully can't forgive herself and perhaps can't ever.

Yet all Hotch does is mirror the exact gesture. He wants to tell her she's crazy. Crazy if she thinks he will give up on her. Crazy if he thinks he can't let her go so easily. He will not. He cannot.

"Do you understand me? _You will_ be okay. _Everything _will be okay. _I promise you._"

The last time he made that promise, it had blown up in his face. He had lost Haley. Jack had lost his mother. He had failed her when she had needed him the most. He had failed his son for another time in his life. He will not this time though.

He simply can't.

What he has done to deserve a second chance, to deserve someone like her, and ultimately _her_, Hotch doesn't know if he can ever find an answer or a reason.

But she is his.

She had loved him and all his scars, the mess and brokenness that his life had turned into and helped him realize that he was worthy of it.

Love, another chance of being with someone, feeling the connections, he deserved it too.

Her cries remain strong.

"I love you, Emily."

Whatever that is happening now, whatever that will happen in the future, his words will be that, he will feel only that for her.

He will have to let her go to keep her safe.

But he will not let _her _go.

"Whatever you're thinking…" he says with firmness. "No matter what, _I love you_."

Hotch catches her quivering lips in his like he has done so already in the night. The saltiness of her tears melts into their kiss as he swallows those oncoming cries. Her tiny hand makes a reach to his shirt and fists it tightly once they part. Through the blurriness; she sees that his eyes are similar to hers. However a frail curve of his thin lips is present.

"We're going to be okay… we're going to be okay…because five years…"

Emily inhales so sharply, her muscles contract. The pain from her stomach spreads instantly and swiftly and her cries can't help but to increase the slightest.

"Do you remember? _Five years_…" he whispers faintly because he remembers and at the moment, she needs to too.

Those thoughts about five years and where they would be _together, _those thoughts about five years he could see too of them _together_ had been whispered during the last few minutes on Christmas Day.

That third Saturday, the twenty fifth day of December; Emily has embedded in her head, in her heart. Nothing can make her forget it. The day that had began at half past nine on a drizzling morning because it hadn't been cold enough for the fluffy white powder. Sergio had been snuggled in her left arm into her bag slung over her shoulder with tiny water droplets on his black fur matching the ones to her dark hair. In her right hand she had grasped the two large shopping bags filled to the top with boxes wrapped in silver and iridescent paper and tie with red ribbons. She was anxious, scared and excited she couldn't deny. The shaky gulp of air taken trying to calm the jumping nerves in her because of the step they were going to take, Emily had knocked on the door. Eleven seconds had passed before the pitter patter of small feet had been heard and his deep voice. Her heart pounded in her chest. She had listened for the faint sounds of his security alarm being turned off. Sergio had let out a soft meow. The chain on the door had been tugged at and the lock twisted, the door had been hurriedly swung opened. A pair of eyes stared up at her while another stared slightly down. Present on both faces had been a smile.

"Merry Christmas!"

The loud excited greeting had been the start of the fun she would have with them, they would have together.

Presents had been first though. The unexpected event because he had been specific the previous Saturday; no presents. All she should bring was Sergio and herself and nothing else. But still, she had shrugged charmingly and teasingly when she had taken out seven neatly and beautifully wrapped boxes for Jack, who jumped and squealed and kissed her twice on the cheek before turning to his boxes with the black feline staring curiously.

"Sorry…" Emily hadn't sounded a bit of it, her voice sweet as the sly beam spread across her face when he had raised his eyebrows. "I couldn't help myself…"

Yet it had also been for her because after she had settled down beside Hotch on the couch with a mug of his favorite dark roast coffee in her hands ready for that presentation of every item received from grandparents, aunt, uncles, cousins, daddy's and even hers, Jack had crawled underneath the fake pine tree decorated with blinking colorful lights and round glittery ornaments. He had retrieved a squared twelve by twelve wrapped gleaming red box with a sparkly yellow ribbon she hadn't noticed from near the back of the tree. Jack ran, jumping onto the couch on the other side of her before thrusting the item on her lap.

"This is for you!"

Her mouth had fallen slightly open. Her eyes had shifted to his father, a minute grin and his dimples appearing whilst nodding ever so faintly. But the sight of his face she didn't settle on long as the excited and gleeful voice to the other side of her had exclaimed loudly, "Open it, Emily!"

She had turned to Jack, the five year old tapping on the box eagerly. Hotch had reached out to gently take the mug of hot liquid from her grasp and placed it on the coffee table. It took her seventeen seconds soon after to pull the ribbon that his son had told her proudly he had tied and rip the paper his father had taped on before Emily had lifted off the lid. The light chuckle had flowed out her mouth with two set of eyes staring at her as her fingers had grazed against the soft and fluffy lime green material.

"Do you like him? I picked him out!" Jack asked enthusiastically.

Because what his question had been for and what his proclamation had been of was the cotton stuffed tyrannosaurus. His son had insisted. Emily would love it. She loved dinosaurs like him. He never ever could forget.

His tiny hand had stretched out once she had removed her present from the box. "It's like the one at the museum!" He stroked the nose of her present. "Do you remember?"

The trip to the museum, her first meeting with him as his daddy's friend, Emily, she hadn't forgotten. The extinct species they had bonded over, and when they had seen the display of the tyrannosaurus, the biggest one in the entire collection, both had declared it a favorite. Emily twisted her head, her vision the slightest blurry while Jack had stared back, waiting for a response.

"Yeah, I remember…" The child had smiled, one like his father's. "Come here." Her arms had slithered around his small body, the dinosaur crushing between their bodies when she smothered his face with half a dozen of kisses before she tickled him. Once she had pulled back from him still in giggles as her thumb had brushed against the faint imprints of her lips off his soft cheeks, she answered his first question from before.

"Thank you. I _love _him… _and_ I think this one is better than the one we saw."

Hotch had stared as his son's face lit up before he had bobbed his head once and twice in agreement. Jack had climbed off the couch, prepared to go through and show all his presents. Emily, with her palm rubbing back and forth the of the lime green tyrannosaurus' head, had snuck a glance at him. He couldn't ignore the light glaze to her eyes. But wordless she had been with pink color rising into her cheeks before she had turned to give her full attention to Jack.

After they had done all he had promised.

The gingerbread cookies they baked and decorated with sugary icing including the chocolate chip cookies Jack had wanted to make as well. Both treats had been dunked into the homemade cocoa she helped him with as the Christmas carols she and Jack sang along to, but Hotch only hummed along to, played in the background from the stereo. And when the red glaring numbers on his cable box and the clock hanging on his kitchen wall struck twelve minutes after nine at night, Jack was finally tucked into bed and sleeping without a story because he had skipped his nap. Sergio had been curled by his side. The light drizzling from the morning had slowly turned to the smallest snowflakes an hour ago that fell steadily from the sky. On one end of the couch they had sat together in silence with her head under his chin and his hand on her back while the cotton stuffed tyrannosaurs occupied the other end.

The day since half past nine in the morning had been something. Exciting, thrilling, and even if she never said a word of it, sitting with him after the baking, the hours of chasing Jack around high on candy canes and icing both she and he had spooned out of the bowl to eat along with the dinosaur and car games they played had her slightly tired.

And so was he.

Waking up at seven minutes to six, the sun barely seen from the horizon, Jack had jumped onto his bed and screamed that it was Christmas at him as if he forgotten. After the forty minutes of opening all his presents, Hotch had bundled his son and himself up for the cold winter weather. For almost an hour they had been in the car, his son quiet in the back seat holding onto the small box tied with an orange ribbon that contained the macaroni bracelet he made at school and a single orange tulip brought the day before at the local flower shop. And when the sun was seen through the gloomy clouds, in the cold they both had sat on the ground as Jack told the stories and moments that had happened since November, the last time he had came by to put the dozen of tulips by the granite headstone.

"You can stay… tonight…" Hotch had mused suddenly and gently. Emily had felt her heart skip a beat. "If you like… you can stay."

She had pulled back from him and twisted her eyes to him. In the lowly lit living room, he had seen the sparkle in her dark eyes and she had seen the anxiousness in his. Another step forward even if already today they had taken a handful.

"It's getting late… and it's snowing. I have extra blankets… pillows… for the couch… if you're worried about Jack. So if you like, you-"

Her mouth had been lightly on his before he could have repeated his offer.

"Thank you…" Her tone had been shy, her cheeks growing rosy. "For the offer… for inviting me over… _thank you_." she finished.

Hotch had lightly nudged her closer to him. "You had fun?"

Emily hummed and bobbed her head twice without delay. "_A blast_."

With a feathery kiss to his cheek, she had snuggled back up against him. He hadn't said a word, but she had felt the twist of his mouth against her head as he exhaled peacefully. Minutes longer they stayed still and quiet again until she had pulled back once more and sat up to meet his stare like before. A wide and teasing curve of her pink mouth graced her face as she straddled him. He had raised an eyebrow at her. "What?"

Her arms snaked around his neck. "I didn't get to give you your Christmas present…" she whispered and grinded against him softly.

Sighing lowly, her warm breath had danced on his skin while his hands had slipped beneath the hem of her snow white sweater to brush along her tender flesh. She had leaned forward to press their forehead together.

"Hmm… I said no presents…" he had mused lightly.

She had giggled. "Sorry…" The tips of their noses grazed against each other's. "I couldn't help myself." Just like previously when those exact words left her mouth, she hadn't meant it.

Before he had said anything in response, Emily climbed off of him, took his hand and tugged him up. Behind her Hotch had trailed down his hallway and passed Jack's closed door until they had reached his room at the end of the hall. She had instructed him to sit on the edge of his bed as the door was closed without noise and locked and the bedside lamp was turned on. The blush of her cheeks in the dim bedroom she hadn't been able to hide standing in front of him. His hands couldn't resist from touching her, running down the back of her jean clad thighs. A sly grin had played across her lips.

"You were supposed to get this earlier…" He watched her index finger sweep over the gold button off her jeans. "_However _Jack hadn't napped. So I thought I would've been going home without giving you your gift as well as breaking my promise because it seems that _you, _Mr. Hotchner, made it to Santa's good list…" One hand then had threaded through his short black hair, massaging his scalp. "But _now _since you asked me to stay ever so kindly… you can get your gift _and _you and I can have _our_ play date."

The seduction in her voice had been just like the previous Saturday. His eyebrows had arched while he looked up at her. Another sugary giggle had flowed out her mouth. And then she had leaned down, kissing him lightly on the cheek before dragging her lips across and up until her hot breath had tickled and teased his ear.

"_Unwrap me."_

Moments it took for the gold button to pop out of place and the tiny zipper he held between his thumb and index fingers tugged at as his mouth had dried tremendously and her breaths had been heavy. Hotch had lowered the fitting dark colored jeans down her hips. Upon the luscious sight of _very_ little Cardinal red lace because it was Christmas after all, shielding her most intimate part, his world had begun turned dizzy. But Emily giggled at him once more devilishly this time to snap him back because just the mere four inches from her very warm core, he had set his eyes on material hugging her creamy thighs. In the same Cardinal red, his large hands grasping the jeans, pushing and pushing until they had fallen to her feet, what he stared at, his fingers journey back up to trace at ends had been high thigh stockings. With swift movements to kick off her boots, she had her stocking feet on his carpet floor. His hands had traveled up the back of her thighs, his fingers lightly digging into the flesh and squeezing her soft backside. She took a small footstep closer and he inhaled sharply, the intoxicating aroma of her ascending up his nose. Hotch had stood then, pulling up the snow white sweater to expose the lace caressing her breasts in the matching color to the rest of the irresistible lace on her, his low and deep chuckle had made her ache. His mouth had found hers, kissing her with fervor before he had turned her around and nudged her onto his neatly made bed. On her back she had laid, her head near the pillows, raven hair splayed out while he had hovered over her, seeing her, admiring her.

The various shades of red lace he has seen and loved against her ivory skin numerous times. But it had been perhaps those surprising high thigh stockings that she wore on her long legs, the last topping; the final item that might had sent him over the edge.

"Is this my present?" he had quipped quietly and lightly with his eyes wandering all over her.

Emily Prentiss was simply gorgeous.

She had lifted her right leg to press her feet to his Federal blue pullover above his heart as her fingers ran along the edges of her bra. He couldn't miss the harden peaks underneath the covers. A hand grazed down the back of her leg, the material wrapping around her silkily and smoothly whilst smiling crookedly towards her.

Shamelessly she had laughed before humming and answering sweetly in a sing song tone that he had just heard the week before, "_Maybe _it is… or _maybe _it's not… "

His hand journeyed down her inner thigh, stopping just inches from the aching folds he could see because really, it had been _very_ little Cardinal red lace. Emily had breathed hard, her long and curled lashes fluttering for a moment. Then she had tilted her head slightly. Her chest rising and falling through her deep gulps of air that smelled of her want and need for him and the lingering detergent and softener of his sheets. And looking at him, directly into him, a gentle bashful grin painted across her face, Hotch had witnessed the pink rising up in her cheeks even more than before.

"Merry Christmas..."

Two hours and thirty three minutes later they had been lying together, sharing the same pillow with their breathing under control. Their damp bodies were sticking together, the top of her head pressed alongside his jaw line. His large hand had been running back and forth tenderly across the side of her thigh. This position they take up so many times in so many places is one of their favorites. But the feeling of the thin and lacey material on her and against his skin had continued to send the pleasuring jolts flying in his body was different. He hadn't wanted to, couldn't peel those off her legs because the feel of material rubbing into his flesh and hugging his torso when he had slid in and out of her was just too wonderful. So he had left them on and she had kept them gladly on through rounds one, two and three and everything else they did to one another in between.

Hotch brought her closer. She set a kiss to his neck. And with minutes passing, he had turned his head just a few degrees and his gaze downcast. Emily craned her neck, gaping at him.

"Hey."

She had beamed at him, the gesture shining brighter than the light bulb in his bedroom and the glow reflecting in from the outside. Her face was gently flushed and her eyes big and dark. For several moments he simply stared at her. Her heart thumped a little harder than usual, wondering what he had been thinking about, feeling of, staring at her like he had.

"You make me happy."

Her gently flushed face intensified a touch with his words. They were soft, passionate as his eyes remained focused solely and strongly on her. It wasn't about the last two hours and forty one minutes now. It was about the last nine months since that night in Atlantic City.

That was what he meant and that was what she had realized.

A chuckle, breathless he had let escape before her mouth puckered against his skin once more. "Hmm… right back at you," she whispered to him.

The silence and stillness resumed. Her short nails scratching on his chest. His hand rubbing circles on her leg.

"Thank you… for your, um… my present," he had murmured following a while. "Even when I said no presents, and you pretend you're sorry… thank you…"

Sugary and amused her laugh had been as his hand had moved up her spine. His fingers had snaked several inches forward to stroke the side of her breast and ribs. She had sighed calmly once he touch the black ink on her flesh, "You're more than welcome."

"And I think I've been out of this for too long…" The dating, the feeling of and actually being in a relationship, he had perhaps forgotten some things. "Because I _really_ didn't get you anything and I'm sorry," he informed her, a twinge of guilt and ridiculous setting into him.

Yet quickly as it had, Emily had twisted her attention to him and smiled faintly as her hand on his chest traveled up to cup his face.

"It's alright, you know." Her thumb caressed his cheek. "I have you… all I want is you…" Playfully she had winked while smiling shyly. "You're my present…"

Because it had been the truth for her; she didn't want, didn't need anything. Many Christmas she had spent alone in her apartment in this city and that state. But today with him, with his son, was better than she could've imagined and more fun than she had in a while on this holiday. She didn't want or need anything else. With the snow tumbling down from the sky, this day coming to its end, all she had wanted was him. It was simple honestly. For the last nine month and counting, he was more than enough, more than she could ever ask for.

His dimples emerged slightly and had without a second passing caused her heart to flutter and her own smile to come out. "Next year…" Hotch had brought her closer. Her face was just a mere inch from his. "Next year… I'll make it up to you next year…"

The comment he had thought that could have drawn a charming chuckle or a quick and light remark from her, had gotten him only the sight of her eyes widening slightly and the feel of her chest against him heaving a touch. A promise, a wish it had sounded like. His thought, the image of them being together still like this again next year were wrapped into his words.

"You think… you think that next year… it would be like this… with us?" The question she asked sounded doubtful, fearful of this topic spoken between them into her ears.

But into his, it had been curiosity.

Curiosity if in a year, it will be like this of them together, in bed and perhaps celebrating the last few hours and remaining minutes of Christmas once again. He had taken the hand on his face and weaved his fingers in and out of hers.

A slight nod he had given her. "I can see it..." Hotch had heard her suck in a breath. "Next year…"

Emily had wondered if he had realized what he was doing then. That moment as he had told her he could see it, them together next year; his thumb had been rubbing the base of her fourth finger of her left hand. She didn't pull it back, she didn't mention it, only continued feeling the wonderful callousness of his touch.

"And maybe… and maybe even five years…"

Her heart had stopped. Her throat constricted, dry as ever. The sight of his face, gauging for her reaction at his words, the possibility of being with her, _together _still five years later turned hazy.

It had taken her a full one hundred and twenty seconds until she found her voice hoarse and trembling. "Yeah?"

His thumb halted. His hand enveloped around hers. Close to her face he had lowered his to. His mouth hardly half an inch from hers, Emily had unexpectedly felt a teardrop fall into his pillow. Yet Hotch had grinned faintly still at her and felt the tugs to his heartstrings.

"Yeah… I can see that _too_..."

What she pictured about every now and then, together; her and him still _together_ in five years he saw.

Emily had wasted no moment and caught his thin lips in hers then _and_ now because she does remember.

That night, that moment when her thoughts turned into possibilities for _their_ future with his words has been stitched into the center of her heart and the side of her brain ever since.

But now that night, that moment will be nothing more than thoughts again. One hundred and one pieces her heart is breaking into before shattering into one million and one pieces as they hit concrete. It might be impossible to put back wholly after this. How can he still have it, she wants to know. The hope, the certainty that it will be okay, that she will be okay, that they will be okay because she doesn't believe it will be, she will be, they will be.

This will be, _is_, the beginning of their end.

She can't stay.

Not like this, and not with him.

It's too dangerous for her, but especially for him and everyone else.

Because what she had vowed days ago when she had ran, she will continue to do so until the end. Keeping him and them safe is her priority. She will not; cannot risk him and them. He has to know that. He must. Her mouth parts from his and her thumb she brings to his lips. Shaking, his thin lips pucker against her skin.

She releases a sob. "_Aaron-_" Hotch hears the doubt in her tone and his name and merely shakes his head.

He will not hear it.

"I'm not going to say goodbye to you," he states confidently. "Because in five years… I'm going to still have you… you're still going to be _here_… with me… _here_… we will be _together_… _here_ and- and everything will be okay…"

He has to keep telling her that, reminding her that. It is his promise to her, for them.

The tip of his thumb makes a quick wipe at her eyes.

"You still see it..." He nods, wanting, and desperately needing her to follow his movements. "You still see it _too_- _you and me_… _five years_… _Emily_…"

She wants to scream. She wants to yell at the top of her lungs to tell him to stop. To simply stop giving her the hope she hasn't been dig up anywhere in her. To simply stop having the hope in him that will do him no good because all he will be faced with; hit with is the sheer disappointment that she will have to leave and the possibility of seeing him again, the possibility of them _together _in five years might not ever happen. Those words in black ink underneath her left breast were never meant for a situation like this.

The onslaught of tears continues to fall from her eyes. "_I love you, Aaron_…" They can't even last a year. They will not have the opportunity to even see a year, but he sees five years from now for them. "_I love you_ _so much_..."

But she can't.

Emily doesn't have the energy, the strength to do so. She can't pop that last dream, the bubble of hope. She can't take that away from him. She already has taken so much away from him in these last few weeks, days, hours, minutes, and even seconds, she can't do that to him anymore.

"_No._" A lone tear trickles down from his. "_I'm not_ _going to say goodbye to you_…" And the emphasis on each and every word has her heart gripped and wringed at without abandonment.

She can't feel anything any longer in her.

Six months ago, they were happy. Their hearts swelling with the newfound joy and excitement at the peace and pleasure they discovered in one another. Their biggest worry and fear had been getting caught with one another, sneaking into one another's room in this city and that state. And now six months later, they are breaking. Their hearts ripping without control as the pain soars through their veins and tears streak down both their faces. Their biggest worry and fear is to hold onto one another, to find and have the hope that they will be okay and that in five years, what they had whispered on their first Christmas night together will be the truth, will happen.

"We're going to get through this..."

He will give up anything for her. He will give up everything for them.

Hotch tips his head forward, taking her quivering mouth in his, sucking her bottom lip like he has done so many times since that March night. All she can taste through the salty tears is his hope, his faith. Not the finality that is running through her head. He truly believes it. He is honestly certain that everything will work out for her, for them. And once he parts from her, in his gaze, in between the watery pupils, she sees the love and determination. Emily wants to ask. How he has turned into this, how even after all of this he sees them having a future. She might regret this. He might in time too. But watching him, watching this strong, intense, reserved man that she has fallen in love with, found herself giving more parts of herself to any other person she had allowed into her life, into her heart, shedding tears and breaking down before her, hoping for the future that appears bleak, she will try. She has to. Even if only a little, for now, she will, has to continue digging a bit deeper through every part of her to look for the hope and will try for him because of him.

His graze sweeping tenderly over bruised her cheek; Emily feels herself giving him the faintest of nods.

"_Okay_…"

Her right hand lifts to his face, the tips of her finger going over the lines at the corner of his eyes because the weak and sad curve of his thin lips materializes. He leans forward, foreheads pressing, noses grazing by the tips and the close image of her long lashes clumped together by the tears, she breathes heavily and swallows hard before echoing his words a bit too painfully, "_We're going to be okay_…"

Then it's his turn to nod. "_Five years_…"

Almost simultaneously, both their eyelids drop shut as they inhale deeply. His eyes remaining close, Hotch takes her hand from his face. Their fingers intertwine. Their clasp is tight. Their knuckles turn white. He will hold onto her for as long as possible.

Drip drop. Drip drop. Drip drop.

For a long while then they stay like this. Her right hand in his left, her left hand in his right, listening to each other's breathing, listening to the continuous raindrops hit against the window and the still occasional beeps from the monitor that is attached to her, they are frozen and together. What they have gotten themselves into; she doesn't have an inkling of it. But they are together now. In whatever this is; this potential bigger heartbreak in their path, something perhaps worse than this, they are together in it.

And that matters.

"You're tired?"

His soft inquiry takes her out her thoughts. Her eyes open to him. She is. The tiredness is too evident and so is his concern. Her cheeks are covered in stains still even after three sweeps from his thumb.

"You can go to sleep-" Emily shakes her head lightly, cutting off what he wants to say.

She still won't. Not now. Not when he's here with her.

Quietly Hotch sighs before carefully lifting his head to press his mouth to her temple and tugs his suit jacket a bit more securely. Once his head is lowered down back onto the pillow, she scoots her head nearer to his and twists her gaze downcast. For the first time since he has walked into the room, she sees it. That perfect knot of his tie. It remains clean and straight even with the hour of the moment and the day he has been through. He does them so well and so tight. A bonus in the daytime when she stares him for seconds too long because she knows that underneath the suit and tie is a man with scars that make him beautiful and who can turn her world upside in more ways she can count. Yet it is a pitfall in the nighttime when their lips reluctantly rip apart as her giggles and his pants mix because she finds herself struggling with one of many barriers before he can cover her with his entire naked body. Her fingertip brushes against the tip of the knot. Never could she would have thought the simple silky material he wears around his neck can convey more than just the final piece to an outfit. And now staring at this tie that looks as if he's working and catching the monsters of the world when in reality he's working to make certain she knows he won't give up on her, on them and catching her before she falls down further the dark abyss she feels a faint cry wanting to run out. But she does her best to suppress it.

Hotch nudges gently with the tip of his nose, wanting her look back at him. "It's fine… if you want to…" he tells her.

And Emily wonders if he knows why she won't, why she can't. It's because of him, because she's afraid still of him disappearing when her eyes close.

"You need to rest…" His voice trails off as she bites her lip.

She knows that. She feels that. All over her, her body is telling her she needs it now. But if he is aware of her reasons, he will understand why she won't, she can't just yet.

He does his best to smile. "I won't go anywhere…"

Perhaps it's what he says, that triggers it. But she can't control it; pull back the question that she has been thinking about. "How long… how long can you stay?"

The desperation is in her question. The guilt is written on his face.

He doesn't know. He doesn't even know what time it is. The sky outside remains dark and the raindrops continue to seep and cover the crevices of the city. When he had walked on this floor, preparing to walk down the halls to find her, it had been exactly twenty minutes to four in the morning. And after the confessions admitted, the secrets revealed, and the promises made, time has ticked away. Their time together has gone by when all he had wanted was to find a way to stop the world from turning.

So instead of telling her those three little words of uncertainty, Hotch lets go of her right hand and pushes her head closer to his. "Just… close your eyes…" He bobs his head, encouraging her to do so. "Just for a little while…"

Drip drop. Drip drop. Drip drop.

Emily is disinclined to as she simply shakes her head another time. Yet the sweet kiss that is set to her mouth, the tender coil of his lips present on his face before he nods once more makes her do so. He won't go until he has to. And when her eyelids slide slowly down, she hears him again.

"We're going to be okay…"

Then for how long after he doesn't have a clue of because he refuses to look directly at the time, he's watching her sleep. He can't while she simply couldn't fight it off any longer. So his eyes follow the slow and steady rise and fall of her chest. Every now and then he pulls his suit jacket a centimeter or two higher. His ears memorize the beautiful patterns and melody of her breathing. Once in a while he tucks falling strands of her hair back. His right hand remains grasping onto her left. He snaps this image of her and locks it into the back of his head. And outside, the rain continues steadily on but the black sky turns dark grey. The very early dull morning light seeps pass the windows and into the room.

Staying here with her like this will be ending soon.

His eyes fall close for a brief moment. He hauls a sigh.

People will begin to look for him. When they will knock on his door three or four times or try turning the door handle once or twice, before calling his phone, they will realize he's not inside his room. He's somewhere else. But not here though with her because she's not suppose to be here, breathing and living and okay.

A whimpers startles him out his thoughts. Faint, scared, the sound pierces through the raindrops, the beeps of the monitor. His gaze is back to her. The grip of his hand intensifies.

"Emily… Emily…"

Her eyes fly open instantly at the gentle sound of her name. She quietly gasps, her chest heaving as her pupils tremble. The alarm is etched across his face. He presses his nose to her cheek. "You're okay…" he murmurs to her.

This might be the beginning of nightmares for her.

Slowly she nods as her vision grows blurry and she turns her head. "You're still here…" she nearly chokes it out

Hotch doesn't know whether to chuckle and smile at the innocence of her words or perhaps cry with her because seeing her like this, feeling her fears and tensions radiating off her body without restraint hurts more than he could have imagined possible. But he sets a light kiss on her mouth and whispers against her lips, "I'm right here…"

His thumb strokes the back of her hand. "Thank you…" Her broken words of gratitude that means more than just finding him here still with her squeeze his heart.

He's afraid to ask, but he also knows he has to. "You want to talk about it?"

Instantly Emily shakes her head. She doesn't want to talk about it, being found, losing him, losing them, and watching everyone vanish before she blinks. Her answer, he accepts without a fight. He can't push her. Not with this, not at this moment because he has suspicions of what is; who is running through her head. Because the only way for them to stop, for him to stop invading her head; is for him to be caught.

So they lay in the stillness of the early raining morning. And after minutes, Hotch turns his eyes to their hands, lifting them up inches while his touch sweeps across her knuckles. Past the third back and forth brush, he gently loosens their hold. But dropping her hand he doesn't do because his large fingers continue to intertwine through her thin and delicate ones. The contrast of their flesh, the difference of sizes in their hands, she can't ever get enough of, she can't ever get over the beauty of their hands together. Like what he had done before tonight, like what he had done Christmas night, Emily watches as he rubs the base of her fourth finger of her left hand.

Drip drop. Drip drop. Drip drop.

The vow he made hours ago, Hotch still remembers. He will keep. He doesn't know where he will start. How he will begin looking for him. But he knows; more sure than anything of how it will end, how he will finish it. Whether it will be with his hands or if he has to absolutely resolve to a bullet, he will do it. He will save her.

And he will bring her back home to him.

"What are you thinking about?"

Twisting his focus to her, a soft yet sweet smile is directed towards him. He is somewhat surprised, yet he welcomes it. It's a beautiful sight he has missed desperately and had thought hours ago that he would never see again. So he returns his own smile, one that is accompanying by the faintest of indentations on the side of his face that makes her heart flap. But the words that he wants to speak, answering her question is suddenly replaced by a muted vibration filtering throughout the hospital room. She jumps the slightest at the unknown noise before he recognizes it. Swiftly he tugs on his suit jacket with his free hand and slips it underneath to find the pockets. The light from the screen is almost blinding as the vibration continues. Emily clutches onto his hand again.

Not now.

And her eyes close as he taps onto the screen before placing the device to his ear. The voice on the other end is muffled, but she knows who it is. She can recognize that voice anywhere. She does her best to block out those inquiries and worries. Yet his answers are crystal clear.

"No… I just needed some fresh air," Hotch lies easily and inhales difficultly.

Emily brings their joined hands to her mouth again, setting another kiss to the back of his hand. The tears behind her eyelids are building. And regardless of the rapid blinks she does to make them dry up, the motion falters because he staring as one teardrop slip passes the barriers and journeys down.

"I know… yes… I know… soon…"

A goodbye he doesn't even give before the call ends and the phone is dropped between them. For the first time since he has entered, since he has lain down next to her, they find themselves staring at the time.

Drip drop. Drip drop. Drip drop.

Twenty seven minutes until six on the rainy morning.

"How's JJ?"

Her question nearly squeaks out through her quaking breath because she feels her chest tightening. Almost three weeks since the last girls' night. Their hectic and separate schedules a factor since her transferred and up until since weeks ago, Doyle, as she had spent most night reading over files and looking over her shoulder. Hotch doesn't give her verbal answer, kissing her cheek merely in hopes that she won't cry but knowing that that might just be impossible.

He has to go. She knows it. A large lump forms in her throat. The five great gulps of air she takes fails. He doesn't even have to tell her. Seeing her in the first place, staying with her is already putting her, all of them at risk. He needs to go. Except; he doesn't move. Not for the next sixty seconds. Not for the one hundred and eighty seconds following. Not for the three hundred seconds subsequent.

Not yet.

"I will be okay…"

She will be brave. For him, she needs to be. Emily moistens her lips and turns to face him. The image of his face is blurry. The picture of her face is as well.

"I will be okay…" She nods. "We're going to be _okay_…"

Carefully she shifts forward, capturing his mouth in hers as the tears slide down both their cheeks. It's bittersweet and Hotch feels his lips burning. A heart wrenching sob comes out between them and for a split second she's unsure if it's from him or her. All she registers is that the sound hurts too much. And once she pulls back half an inch, she does her damndest and best to smile while she tells him the words she first whispered to him that October Sunday, that she means with everything she has inside of her.

"_I love you_…"

One thing she will forever feel she is certain of.

"_Five years_…"

One thing he will be more than certain of.

Another time their quivering lips connect and all she knows that he needs to leave now. The longer he will stay the more tears she will shed. The more tears she will shed, the more their hearts will be breaking. There is only so much shattering of that organ before the broken pieces will eventually turn into dust.

In moments their lips are ripped apart. "Go… go… you have to go… it's going to be fine… I'm going to be okay…" she whispers.

A hard press is to her forehead as he inhales and she sighs.

He's never going to let her go.

Gradually his body pulls back without control from hers until he's sitting up. Emily pushes away the sobs and lifts a free hand to swipe quickly across her face. No more crying. No more tears. Not until he leaves because she doesn't want him seeing her like this any longer. It takes a minute before Hotch swings his legs over the edge of the bed and stands. The position he was in had tested his worn and stressed out body and his legs feel unstable and almost jelly like. But showing it to her, he doesn't allow as he turns steadfastly. Their hands remain together while he picks up his phone and pushes it into his pants pocket. Her eyes are fixed at him, watching as he digs through the compartments of his suit jacket that is falling from place over her chest. Out he draws out his credentials and a set of keys and before she realizes it, he's tucking the makeshift blanket over her like he first had earlier while simply clutching onto his items.

"I don't want you to get cold," he tells her softly with a broken smile.

Emily finds herself breathing harder. And then Hotch's back over her, head bent down and their faces and mouth centimeters from touching.

He's not going to say goodbye to her. Not right now. Not like this. When they will become old and grey, when the wrinkles on his face will increase even more and when they will be side by side in a bed they have shared _together_ for almost fifty years; that is when their goodbye will be. That is when their goodbye will eventually take place.

His hand holding his things shifts to brush back her bangs.

"I'll see… I'll see you soon, alright?"

Her free hand covers his and lowers it. She puckers her mouth to his palm.

"_Soon_..."

Three inches their hands shift to the side for him to kiss her one last time until soon. And another first of the night, through the exhaustion of their bodies, the fear they can't escape from and the pain they're drowning in, their tongues glide gently against one another for a mere few seconds. These few seconds that feel like hours, she embeds into her heart and he embeds into his brain. No one can ever compare to how she tastes. No one will ever kiss her like he does.

It's Emily that moves a touch, the tiniest shift that makes him understand that he needs to go.

"I love you…"

No one can ever change that.

"Right back at you…"

Nothing can ever change that.

Slow motion Hotch stands upright and Emily takes her next shallow and thick mouthful of air. Their gazes never waver as their hands reluctantly let go and their fingertips hang on for just seconds more. One step he moves back and she nods, her trembling lips shaping into the two letter word that comes out completely silent.

_Go._

Another step he takes and another and another, their eyes remain together until he's just a footstep and a half to the door. And when he turns on his heels, his shaking hand reaching for the door handle, she turns her head.

She can't watch him leave, walk out that door until the next time she will be seeing him again. That soon she has no idea when will happen, if it will even happen. So Emily twists her teary eyes to set out the window as the faint creak of the door is heard behind her. The rain she loves; those messy little raindrops that continue to fall and rival the fall of her teardrops because everything she had told him once upon a time ago she remembers ever so clearly isn't it right now.

Nothing smells new because all she smells is the familiar something spicy and piney scent of him left behind on the pillow and from his suit jacket that she feels herself grasping onto too tightly. Nothing feels clean because all she feels is dirty and disgusting because the four leaf clover permanent to her flesh will forever be there to tell her that no matter what, Ian Doyle will be in her life. And nothing is beautiful because the face she wants to see, _needs_ to see is no longer beside her and everything is suddenly turning too dark and too black.

This was never supposed to happen.

And as Hotch stands by the cracked door with one foot out, he knows. She will not turn around to watch him leave. She will not let him see the tears that are tumbling rapidly down. So this last hazy look of her until the soon he tells her of, promises to her is the sight of her head directed to the window while her chest heaves and her body trembles.

Drip drop. Drip drop. Drip drop.

She will be okay.

His feet are together. The salty water rises in his eyes.

They will be okay.

The door he closes beside him. His head drops down.

Everything will be okay.


End file.
